Journey
by theBrillianceofNight
Summary: It started drizzling, but we were focused on the task at hand; we were on a mission. We raced through the treetops, leaving our homes after dark, under the cover of the thick mist our village was named for. OC story. Rated for language and a bit of blood.
1. Ch 1: Leaving

I do not own Naruto. I am merely borrowing the circumstances, its universe, and some of its characters for my own enjoyment. I repeat, I do not own Naruto.

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Ch.1: Leaving

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I couldn't believe it. Our time, our chance, was FINALLY here! I had been waiting for months! Well, actually exactly one month. But that month felt like an eternity! We stood there at the gates, awaiting clearance to leave. I looked around myself one last time, trying to memorize the setting I hopefully wouldn't be in for the next month or so.

_I promise I won't come back until I've made it. And I WILL make it. _I promised to myself that none of us would fail, that failure would never be any option for any of the six of us. Who were we? We are shinobi. Three-man squads of ninja. Me—I'm a kunoichi. There were more than six of us going, but we were special. We were the first-timers, the 'newbies'. But in no way were we the weakest. Why? We passed the strenuous trials required for passing a month or so ago. At the ages of 12 and 13. There were very few who had showed more talent at a young age than we six, and they had made history before us.

It started drizzling, but we were focused on the task at hand: we were on a mission. So, I carefully adjusted the band around my waist and took off as they signaled. We raced through the treetops, leaving our homes after dark, under the cover of the thick mist our village was named for.

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A/N: Hey guys, I actually first posted this under a different Penname, but that account got deleted, so here it is again! I'll update as often as possible. Enjoy! And please review with criticism or compliment. I'll take either. Thanks!


	2. Ch 2: Who?

Ch. 2: Who?

* * *

The six of us stayed together, as close as possible as we jumped from branch to branch.

"Hoo? Hoo?" the lonesome owls spoke into the darkness as we sped through the green canopy of the forest. "Hoo? Hoo? Hoo?"

I reminisced back to when we were young children, back in the days when we were carefree, innocent, and unaware of the trying times looming over us. I recalled the day before we were split up. Back then, it didn't matter who a person was or where they were from; anyone could join our games of tag and hide-and-seek.

* * *

_"Hey Yumi, are you coming?" a small six-year-old black-haired boy shouted at a pink-curtained window. "Mayumi? You there?"_

_"She's there all right. She's probably dressing extra nice for her _boyfriend_," a blond haired boy wearing glasses snickered._

_The other boy's ears colored as he replied, "You know I don't like her! I already like someone else, Hideki!"_

_The red coloring spread to his cheeks as he realized what he had admitted. "Anyway, you should just shut up! It's not like _you_ don't like anybody!" His voice suddenly turned happy as he said the last sentence and a wide grin lit up his face._

_Hideki's face turned red as he blurted out, "At least _I_ still have a chance! You still haven't gotten over her, Kazuyuki! She moved away a year ago, and she's not coming back, scat head!"_

_"Nerd!"_

_"Dork!"_

_"Jerk!"_

_"Lover's boy!"_

_"Well at least—" Kazuyuki got cut off as the two rowdy boys spotted a slightly shorter girl with a pink bow in her short black hair emerge from the door of the house in front of them._

_"Hi Deki! Hi Kazu! I packed lunch!" she chirped._

_"Great!" Hideki said as they walked down the path together. "Your blonde friend and that curly-haired kid are already there. You're the last one, Yumi."_

_Kazuyuki stopped with a puzzled look. "Wait, are the other kids there?"_

_"Are they?" Mayumi asked, looking towards Hideki._

_"Yep!"_

_"Wait—what about Tomoko!" Kazuyuki asked._

_"Oh yeah! How could I forget about her? The girl who could be Yumi's twin. Probably," Hideki spewed, sending out flecks of saliva on the 'p'._

_"WAAH!" A figure jumped out from the bushes, with black hair billowing around her head._

_"GAH!" Kazuyuki jumped. Mayumi giggled as Hideki calmly said, "I knew you were there the whole time, Tomoko."_

_"Aww, you're no fun!" I whined as I carelessly ran my fingers through my straight hair, settling it back down beneath the satiny indigo headband tucked into my hair. We soon entered the field and met up with Kaida and Washi and started our game._

* * *

Back in the present, we noticed it was getting brighter through the dense cover of leaves. I nimbly hopped higher until I could see over the thick foliage and found it was already close to high noon. People were dropping down to set up camp and rest, and we did the same, but further on, a little away from the older men and occasional woman. We put out four bedrolls, two on either side of the miniscule clearing.

"Alright," I said, "two girls on that side, two boys on the other. I'm taking first watch, which of you boys is watching with me, and who's taking second and third watch?" They worked it out, then Deki joined me at my perch on a tree branch as Washi, Kazu, Yumi, and Kaida lay down.

"Hey, Tomoko," a voice startled me. It was Deki. "I need to ask you a question…"

* * *

"So… will you help me?"

I looked about our campsite as I pondered the question. Yumi was sleeping peacefully, and Kaida's fingers were twitching, probably looking for the weapon that was always near her. Kazu's eyelids were fluttering as he muttered something about a 'secret technique', and Washi was rolling around in the midst of a dream. Back to the problem, on one hand, I'd be glad to help Deki out, but I couldn't answer, for my other 'hand' was tied down by the thought, 'he just told me one of his biggest but kind of obvious secrets. Why?'

I turned back to face him and said, "I need a little time to think. But it will almost positively be a yes," I concluded with a smile.

He grinned back at me and said, "I think it's past time for those two, your violent friend and that pissy friend of hers with the 'special' water bottles, to wake up and take their turn!"

Washi groaned as he woke up and mumbled, "They're NOT water bottles, you lesbo."

"Yes, yes, yes," Deki replied sarcastically. "Of COURSE they aren't," he said, ignoring Washi's last comment.

"Shut up Hideki," Yumi said as she jumped up next to us. "Tomoko, go to sleep now. You too, Deki!" she said in an oh-so-sweet and oh-so-innocent voice that quickly turned dark as she added, "or else the snakes'll get ya, and you don't want us to be HAPPY, do you?" she ended with a fooling 'cute' smile.

"Yes, yes, yes, I'm going now," Deki grumbled.

"Yeah, I definitely need sleep," I added with a yawn as I crept under the cover of the bedroll Yumi had just vacated. "G-day! We'll be up dark and early tonight and move on!" And with that I fell asleep.


	3. Ch 3: Attack!

Ch. 3: Attack!

* * *

I woke to the sound of two people arguing. One was insisting that whatever it was that he was saying was true, and the other voice, that was… yes it was, Kazu's voice telling the man to "friggin' go!"

I opened my eyes and found that Kaida was getting ready to drop down from a tree behind the invading man, and she was armed with her katana and ready to kill if things got out of hand. Yumi was up, Washi was standing in a battle-ready stance with a sneer on his face, and the fourth bedroll was already packed up. Deki was nowhere to be seen, but obviously, no one else was worried, so I didn't worry either.

Kazu shifted his glance over to Washi and nodded his head, looking at the many fragile-looking vials attached to the belt around Washi's waist. "Sleep juice, I'm thinking," he said as he subtly smiled. Then Kazu pulled out a kunai and started waving it about.

While the man was distracted, Washi made a few hand signs that I recognized-he was going to move the sleep-inducing liquid from one of the vials into the man's body to sedate him. I smiled at their teamwork despite the fact that we were on different teams.

As the man slumped to the ground, merely unconscious, Deki emerged from a small clump of trees, completely unperturbed by the unmoving man in front of Kazu. I finished packing up my bedroll, then secured our supplies in a scroll that I handed to Kaida to put in her large scroll carrying-case that was almost always strapped to her back.

"Let's go," Kazu said to her, slinging the tall man over his shoulder.

"You've got about ten minutes until he wakes up," Washi told them.

"Too easy," Kaida replied as she polished her blade. The two of them ran off as we destroyed any evidence of our stay.

"Hey, Tomoko, replace my sleepy water," Washi said over his shoulder as he covered up a heavyset footprint.

"No," I simply replied from my perch in the tree. "And I don't care if you're older than me or are my 'elder.' Oh, and Deki, my answer is yes," I said without opening my eyes.

"Why not?" Washi whined. "Please?" he pleaded when I didn't answer.

"Fine," I gave in. "It's ironic, though, ya know—you make a big deal about being older than me, even if only by a few hours, yet I'm much more mature than you." If you haven't figured it out yet, Washi and I have the same birthdays. Always have, always will. Unfortunately.

I opened up the notebook I always carried in the pouch strapped around my right thigh. I found the flower easily, for I had replenished his supply often on co-team missions and in training. I pointed to the flower, saying, "See this white flower? Get me three blossoms, and pick the whole thing, all the way down to the roots."

He quickly scanned my written description and nodded. "Got it," he said in his high-pitched voice. I leaned back against the trunk attached to the branch I was sitting on. I heard Kazu and Kaida return.

"Find the guy's team?"

"Yeah. The dude was delusional," Kaida said.

"Uh huh! He was seeing things all wavy and weird!" Kazu grinned and did the 'wave' with his arms as I looked at him.

Washi came back with the flowers. One was edible, but was of the wrong species and had no special properties. Another was too shriveled up to use. I mashed up the last one with some water, courtesy of Deki, and refilled Washi's vial. I shook Yumi awake, as she had apparently fallen asleep, and we went back on our way.

We started off at a slow pace, but once we fell into a steady rhythm, we slowly sped up. Soon we were nearing the front of the 'pack'.

"Hey little girl!" an intoxicated-sounding man said.

"Oh shiz," Kazu grumbled. "It's him again."

"Yeah, what was that guy's problem?" I asked inquisitively.

"Kazu, don't say anything," Kaida commanded. "That guy thought his kid came along and that we were just the children of some of the shinobi of the group. We obviously proved him wrong. He was going crazy over the thought that he lost his kid. Freaky weirdo."

"Yeah, you, black-haired girl. Get over here. You're going to listen to me now, or your little friends get it," he said, suddenly sounding threatening and clearheaded.

"Please tell me you didn't turn around," I hopelessly asked Yumi.

"Uhh… no?" Yumi said in a high, unconvinced voice.

"Really, now," Kaida said sarcastically.

"Well… yes?" she tried in an even higher voice than before.

"Shoot…" I sighed. "All right then. Come on, guys. Look's like we're gonna have to fight. Formation 0-92!"

Kazu excitedly jumped into a stance that could be both defensive and offensive as we all dropped to the ground, and I ran over to my position according to the plan. Deki walked slowly to his spot on the left side and said, "Next time let _me_ choose the plan. I _am_ the strategist, you know."

I ignored him and concentrated on finding thick, sturdy tree roots to grow. I concentrated the chakra to my feet and made the hand signs I needed.

"Well what do we have here?" The man chuckled derogatorily. "The little girl is fighting now!"

"Little?" I asked as I pushed chakra through the dirt and into the tree roots, especially into a tree root beneath my opponent. "Again, little? Wrong move."

I pushed the roots upwards by activating the chakra flowing through them, and the root beneath the opponent pushed out of the soil and wrapped tightly around his waist, trapping him.

"Washi, Yumi, Kaida! Help us out! Washi, you get over here, Kaida go up front with Kazu, Yumi, in back, and Deki, info!"

"Well… judging from his tattooed arms and the coarse cloth…"

"Hurry it up!" I said as I threw a milky white flower to the other five, telling them to inhale the flower's scent until I said.

They all breathed deeply, so I lifted myself upward on a tree root platform, then did the necessary hand signs. I drew a deep breath, then blew out over my cupped hands, releasing a cloud of pollen and other sweet plant scents. Anyone who took a slight whiff of my 'perfume' without the counteracting blossom would sink into a tortured genjutsu sleep. I reached out my chakra for some vines, attempting to make them move so they would tie around our collapsed opponents. They didn't budge. I looked up and saw why; they were shriveled up and dead, without a chakra system to take control of, and on top of that, literally on top, was a man, stepping on the green snake-like plant.

"Guys," I said slowly. "There's more of them." My genjutsu harbinger had already dissipated, so I left the newcomers to the others. I jumped off lightly and toppled the platform forwards, hoping to impede the advancing of the enemy. "Deki, you mind finishing?"

"As I was saying," he spurted out, flecks of saliva shooting out at every word, "These guys have weaknesses to ice, sand, are very strong, but not very quick." He nodded in order at Yumi, no one in particular, to Kazu, and then at Kaida's heirloom ice-energy katana.

"Washi, let's take out these sitting ducks," I said to him. He nodded in agreement.

I continued my genjutsu, an lurid, painfully bright and colorful world with gigantic wasps that stung painfully, and caused the whole body to bloat up and then explode with a disgusting, yellowish-green pus. Next came the ants that bored through the skin, into the bone, then the worms that entered through every opening in the body, including those made by the ants. Finally—they watched those close to them—or who were once close to them—undergo the same painful fate.

This continued until each fighter under its influence either collapsed or broke out.

With so many people trapped, it was quite weak, so the two of us ended up physically immobilizing most of the men with a kick to the face (or neck) or a drop of paralyzing liquid on their tongues.

When our job quickly ended, we joined into the brawl. Washi stopped men in waves with a fire jutsu he learned from the Fire Country chunnin who brought news from the Village Hidden in the Leaves to our village.

Kaida chopped down people left and right, literally, swinging her silvery blue, thin, agile blade easily through the air. Kazu went blazing through the people, punching, kicking, landing barrages, and spinning around in a literal taijutsu whirlwind. Yumi finished up his victims with a lightning-fast, nearly invisible ice senbon needle attack. She didn't have the kekkei-genkai of Haku's bloodline for nothing.

Deki swept away the enemy with waves and bursts of poisoned liquid from his water jutsus, while I stayed in back, covering their backs by taking them out myself with weaponry, using the ever-abundant plant-life, or with brute chakra-powered strength.

"Hey Kazu! Kick that purple flower at 3 o'clock!" It went in his opponent's face and the afflicted immediately broke out into an itchy, painful rash. I helped in any way I could, even by just raising up knobby tree roots for the enemy to trip over.

Even after we had fought nonstop for over an hour, there still seemed to be no end to the reinforcements.

"Deki, who are all these people?" Yumi gasped as she rested for a little under five seconds. "I'm positive—SHITtake–that there weren't _this_ many people in the transport!" She quickly dodged an incoming shuriken, but was cut in the shoulder by a kunai as a result.

"God, they're getting smarter!" Deki shouted. "They're—SHIT!"


	4. Ch 4: Escape

Ch. 4: Escape

* * *

"Oh my god Deki, are you okay?" Yumi shrieked, running to him.

"Yeah. Nothing like a fucking shuriken in your fucking side to fucking help you get to your fucking point!" he groaned spitefully.

"Kazu! Kunai at 7 o'clock!" He dodged as I ran over to Deki. "Yumi, get back in there! Deki, you can still talk, so talk! Washi, throw me some water!"

"As I was saying," he started as I began to wash his wound, "They're rogue ninja! They heard the fucking fighting, so those bastards decided to take the stinking 'prizes' from afterwards!"

I applied a thick red liquid from a small bottle in my pouch, then waited for it to dry. For once, I condoned his swearing, for I knew that the more he swore, the more pain he was in.

"Take that, lesbo!" Washi yelled as he toppled a particularly masculine adversary. Yumi was next to him, sending out kunai, shuriken, ice spikes, whatever she could think of.

"We're going to be late," Kaida said calmly, as if nothing was bothering her. It was true, for she was used to dealing with blood. But I could see how desperate the situation was, even from where I was still crouching next to Deki, for Kaida was now fighting dual-bladed, with both her ice katana, and her huge, summoned, water-affinity mace.

"There's too many of them!" I shouted exasperatedly, shrieking involuntarily when a kunai almost cut my stomach open. "Let's take to the trees!"

We all hopped quickly into the trees. Kazu was supporting Deki, so I quickly blocked our pursuers with a dense wall of branches and vines. It wasn't strong enough, so Kazu threw some chakra-proof ninja wire so it crisscrossed, making a web, and Yumi reinforced it with a thick layer of ice.

Kaida stayed up front, lopping away branches in our path, while Washi stayed right behind her, looking for possible places to hide. "Deki, would we be able to hide from them?" Washi, our camouflage expert asked.

"Yes, yes, yes, I'm sure of it. FUCK!" he yelled as a particularly rough landing jarred his wound—it was worse than I had thought. Deki turned and addressed Washi by his last name. "Warami?"

"Kay, drop down… NOW!" Washi yelled when we came to a particularly narrow opening in the branches. I quickly moved some vines to soften Kazu and Deki's landing. Deki still grunted in pain.

"Over here!" Washi shouted as he ran back in the direction we came.

"WHAT!" Kazu yelled. "Are you trying to get us killed!"

"NO! I'm getting them off our trail! There's a spot in the roots of this big old tree, with lots of plants in the opening! There!" I was relieved when I saw plenty of feathery ferns in the opening.

We all dove into the gap between the roots, finding a low but spacious 'room'. I quickly grew some roots over any openings and moved in some fluorescent fungi so that we could see.

We made it just in time: we soon heard our first barrier shattering. "Shut the hell up and don't move," Deki murmured.

We waited while Deki sat agitatedly, then we tensed up when he relaxed. _Are they gone?_ I thought, looking at him meaningfully. He nodded, so Kazu moved. He moved his knee into Deki's side.

"FUUUU…" he hissed. I glared at him out of habit. But, my glares must have been pretty frightening because he ended, "…UUUJAH."

"Kaida, check how far those assholes went," Washi commanded. For once, Kaida complied without a word. I lowered our extra defenses.

After I let Kaida and Washi out, I turned around to find Deki leaning against Kazu with a hand to his side and his eyelids fluttering closed.

"SHIZ!" I almost swore, I was that worried. His wound was on his left side, below the ribs. "Kazu, Yumi, keep him on his right side and send out a burst of chakra if he faints. Talk to him, keep him talking no matter what. I need to gather my supplies."

Yumi looked up fearfully and Kazu reassuringly smiled at her, although the smile never reached his eyes. I nodded then sprinted out into the cool shade of the forest.

I yanked out a kunai, then started slashing away at the bark of likely trees. "Just my luck. I _knew_ I should have learned that medical jutsu when that woman offered. Bingo!" I cheered when I saw the thick red sap dripping down from the cut. "That's dragon's blood all right, just what I need for a refill." I snapped off some of the leaves of a kalanchoe plant to use as an analgesic and sedative, then threw some rose seeds, usually stored in my hip pouch, onto the ground. I sprouted up some blossoms from the seeds, then removed the parts of the plant I needed. "Rose hips, check…" I ran back to the tree and snatched up some small, thin, and feathery ferns for bandages as I slid through the opening of our hideout.

"Have Washi and Kaida come back yet?" I asked as I burst through the gap.

"Washi yes, Kaida no," Yumi answered.

"Yumi, go get him. Kazu, I need your help."

Yumi ran for Washi, while I wiped some blood from Deki's wound and summoned a bowl carved out of sturdy wood and covered with a tough tree-sap glaze from a scroll. I motioned for Kazu to fill up the bowl with water he could find and bring up from pure underground aquifers, all the while asking Deki questions to keep him talking and awake, while gently peeling off the dried dragon's blood 'skin.'

"Deki, I need you to be unconscious for this part. Do you feel comfortable with this?"

"Yes," was the weak reply.

"Do you trust me?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"Yes, you do. I could tell someone else to do it while I instruct them on what to do."

"No, you're the expert. I trust you and only you."

"Very well then." What I left unspoken was, _I_ am _able to deal with blood, which is a good thing._

His eyelids finally shut without the help of the kalanchoe, but I squeezed some of the leaf juice into the wound anyway, just in case he woke up early. Yumi came rushing back in with Washi. I ran over the step-by-step process once more in my head.

I threw the rose hips into the bowl filled with water, then handed it to Washi. "Washi, hold it here, apply small but intense heat with your fire jutsu, then get it to boiling. Kazu, when that happens, put in the ferns, but leave the stems hanging out." They both gravely nodded back at me.

I looked at my 'patient' carefully. His face was even paler than before due to blood loss. I carefully poured my chakra into his body the way I would push chakra into plants I was growing and moving. I used the chakra to search for the metal projectile in the wound, and found it deep within the cut. I willed the muscles around it to slowly maneuver out the fatal object until the edge showed. I got a grip on the shuriken shard, then cooperated with the muscles to slowly remove it. I let out a deep breath. The hard part was over.

I checked to see that the ferns were supple enough, then sent Yumi back out to find Kaida, and partly to help her recover from seeing the blood and her good friend in pain.

I gently washed off the blood, then applied the dragon's blood sap over the wound, ignoring the metallic smell of blood and silently thanking Washi for finding a hiding place so close to a provider of this antiseptic and antifungal sap. I covered up the wound with ferns so no dirt could sneak in while the sap was drying and hardening into a bandage-like covering over the wound. Yumi soon came in with Kaida.

I sat back and smiled. "I've done what I can, let's just pray that none of his organs were punctured."

Everyone else relaxed as well, even Washi. "Well, it's a good thing that he has you on your team," Washi admitted.

"Washi, you do know that not everyone can be on your team? There's a limit of three people," Yumi said in a slightly annoyed tone.

"Glad it happened in the lush forest instead of in a barren desert somewhere," I said shakily. I was exhausted, and Deki couldn't be safely moved anyway, so we stayed put, and as soon as we leaned against the walls of our hideout and on each other's shoulders, letting Deki stay lying in the center of the space, we all fell asleep.

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A/N: So, love it? Hate it? Constructive criticism is what helps authors and stories get better, readers! Thank you for your time.


	5. Ch 5: The Next Day

Ch. 5: The Next Day

* * *

"RISE AND SHINE!" I jerked awake as a loud voice shouted in my ear.

"What the heck!" I muttered through gritted teeth, looking around to see that Deki was snoring away, and Kazu and Kaida were nowhere to be found.

"What, we're hungry!" Washi whined.

"You're a big boy, you can feed yourself. Go get some food from our supplies or something."

"There's just one problem with that…" Yumi said, her voice getting higher in pitch at the 'one'. "Kaida dropped the scroll with our supplies and it disappeared."

"WHAT!" This time it was my turn to scream. "You all still have your personal storage scrolls with clothing and everything?" Yumi nodded.

"But they have no food in them!" Washi complained.

I sighed loudly. "Fine. I'll go get some food. Yumi, make some ice for Deki - he's bound to be sore. By the way, I forgot, is the cut on your shoulder okay?" She nodded again and showed me the thin scab. "Alright, Washi, start a fire. But DON'T set the whole forest on fire. Here, I'll show you where."

I led them both to a small clearing a little away from our hiding spot. "They were rogue ninja..." I pondered aloud the events and information from before. "No wonder Deki didn't stop Kaida when she started lopping off heads." I turned around to find Yumi a sickly shade of green. "Oh, right, sorry, visual mind, right?"

She faintly nodded, then shook her head to rid herself of the thought before saying, "I need water to make ice."

I mentally slapped myself, then said, "Go find Kazu." She nodded yet again.

After a few trials and errors, I found some edible tubers. I walked back to find a pan from Washi's personal stock (don't ask) set over the fire he had made, and Yumi was sitting next to a now awake Deki in our natural shelter. Deki was holding some ice to his side while chatting with Yumi.

I smiled and turned around to prepare the potato-like tubers for cooking. I pulled over a flat rock slab and started cutting the tubers into thick slices with my kunaii. I threw the tuber slices into the pan to fry. I had just flipped over the first batch when I heard someone landing lightly behind me. I hadn't spent seven years on the same team with him for nothing, so I knew it was Kazu. I stayed silent, waiting for him to speak first.

As I added in a few crushed herbs and some honey to add taste, he spoke up.

"Hey, Tomoko?" he said slowly, as if he was thinking. "Is Deki going to be okay?"

It was hard for me to keep myself from reassuring him immediately. Deki was his best friend after all. I thought for a bit about how to word my answer, then decided that lying to him would just make it worse. I turned to face him.

"I'm not sure. He will probably make it, but I don't know how healthy he will be. He's suffered a lot of blood loss, an organ may have been punctured, and he never was that strong in the first place."

"Compared to you, you mean," Kazu said, smiling. "But then, there aren't too many people as strong as you," he added, finally sounding like his usual clueless but cheerful self again. "Say, maybe you should be a med-nin!" he said excitedly.

"And miss kicking you and Deki's butts during training? Think again!" We laughed together, and turned to find Deki and Yumi laughing with us. Kaida appeared out of nowhere as always, and Washi rushed into the clearing, proclaiming, "Do I smell French Fries?" with a wide smile on his face.

"Shut up and sit down, Warami," Deki said rolling his eyes.

I passed around the crispy tuber slices, before commenting, "Deki, I know you were hurt, but was it really nice to say those rogue ninjas were poo?"

Everyone looked at me strangely.

"What? He said, 'Gosh, they're getting smarter. They're—POO!' Remember?"

"You mean when I was going to tell you they were getting used to our attack styles? And then I got hit so I yelled 'SHIT,' is that what you're talking about?"

I nodded happily.

"Oh. You're really weird," Washi said.

"Thanks!"

"…Wasn't a compliment…"

"Ah, but then you'd be insulting yourself, right?"

And as if on cue, we all laughed at the ongoing joke, and as the six of us sat around the 'campfire', we remembered and laughed about other old times and memories.

We continued to enjoy ourselves as we went around picking acorns for the next day, and joked around with each other as I instructed them in grinding them up, soaking them, then laying them out in the sun to dry. And a fun water-fight afterwards couldn't hurt either, right!

Things were certainly looking up.


	6. Ch 6: Payback Time

Ch. 6: Payback Time!

* * *

Morning found most of us up. Kaida was off, probably training by chopping down trees and pretending they were victims. Kazu was trying, and failing, to help me get breakfast together, and Deki was attempting to get up and attack something or someone for revenge while Kazu and I yelled at him to stop moving. I even had to go so far as to use tree roots to restrain him so he wouldn't reopen his wound.

Yet even through all this, Yumi and Washi were still sleeping soundly.

"What the fuck?" Deki exclaimed, earning a glare from me. "Yumi and that idiot Warami haven't waken up yet!"

I smiled darkly at Kazu and Deki. "Make sure the acorn pancakes don't burn, got it? I've got some revenge to exact," I said, motioning towards the hideout. I snickered mischievously as I crept into the larger-than-it-seemed space that was our shelter during the night, where Yumi and Washi were dreaming away on opposite ends of the 'room'. I drew a deep breath, then,

"ARE YOU SLEEPING? ARE YOU SLEEPING, YUMI AND WASHI! YUMI AND WASHI! THERE ARE NO BELLS TO RING HERE, THERE ARE NO BELLS TO RING HERE, BUT I CAN YELL! I CAN YELL!"

I shouted the rhyme, singing it tunelessly and very loudly. It had the desired effect.

"DAMN!" Washi swore, "Talk about the gayest of lesbos!"

"We're up now. And we're not likely to forget you any time soon," Yumi grumbled, rubbing the top of her head where she had banged it on the ceiling.

I smiled evilly, then shouted yet again, saying, "MWAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! I have triumphed yet again!"

"And you're not likely to live for more than five more seconds," Washi threatened.

"Oh, and you're one to speak about lesbianism," I teased. "It's a known fact that you're a girl, and I've seen how you've been eyeing Y—" I was unable to finish as Washi charged toward me with a malicious roar. Yumi started laughing as I nimbly sidestepped Washi, shouting after him, "I was just going to say yarrow!" as he barreled through the opening.

"Wait, yarrow's a plant, right?" Yumi asked. I nodded, and she looked confused.

"Yarrow's everywhere here—he'd be looking at it everywhere!" Yumi barked out laughter as soon as she understood.

Yumi and I followed after Washi, giggling, and our laughter only increased when we saw Washi in a heap on what _was_ our campfire and covered in acorn pancake batter. "Hey Washi, your hair's on fire!" I called out.

He grabbed his hair fearfully, while Yumi and I doubled over in laughter. Kazu stood looking amused, and Deki sat, as indifferent as always. "Just kidding."

Washi growled at me, and I caught Kazu suddenly shaking with laughter out of the corner of my eye. Kaida entered the scene, saying calmly, "I could hear the laughing from a mile away. What happened?"

One look towards the figure in the middle of the clearing, and Kaida started chuckling too. Washi sat grumpily until he saw just how ridiculous he looked when Yumi conjured up a sheet of reflective ice, then even _he_ started laughing.

"C'mon," I said, still laughing. "Why don't you wash up in the stream over there? We should all take turns. We reek." As I 'escorted' Washi to the small brook I had found, I heard Kaida laughing even louder when she heard how Washi's sandals squelched, damp with batter.

I left Washi at the stream with the constant reminder to send out a burst of chakra if trouble came along. As I came back to the clearing, I found Kazu, Yumi, and Kaida trying to hold in their laughter while Deki was missing. An immediate burst of Washi's chakra confirmed my suspicions. Kazu, Yumi, and Kaida felt it too and reacted with more laughter, and I felt a smile stretch across my face.

"What does Deki have against Washi?" I said to no one in particular. "He just can't stop bugging poor Washi, can he." A nod from Kazu confirmed that. "What did he do this time?"

Following Yumi's gaze behind me, I found Washi storming in, but the effect was ruined by the fact that he had nothing on but a towel wrapped around his waist.

"A f-cking snake attacked me, then SOMEONE stole my f-cking clothes," he mumbled spitefully, glaring significantly at Deki, who had just silently slipped behind us. I handed Washi's clothes to him when I found them in the hand I had had behind my back.

After he stormed back off, Deki grumbled, "You spoil all my fun."

I shook my head at him, my lips threatening to stretch into a wide smile, especially when I heard Washi yelping that he hurt his ankle.

"Well Deki, since you obviously have completely recuperated, and can move easily, we're packing up and moving on _bright and extremely early_ tomorrow morning! And if his ankle doesn't heal by then, _you_ get to carry Washi," I said sweetly, before dashing into a clump of trees behind me, intending to go see what happened to our curly-haired teammate.

The following burst of colorful language and even more laughter reassured me that payback was oh-so-sweet.


	7. Ch 7: Arrival

Ch. 7: Arrival

* * *

It was morning, the third day after we had first been delayed, and we were currently on the move. "We should be there NOW," I complained listlessly and impatiently.

"I know!" Washi elaborated. "They're probably waiting for us now, thinking how it was a bad idea to let us come! And I was _so_ looking forward to battling people!"

I blinked pointedly before remarking, "Washi, you just killed at least twenty ROGUE ninja in an all-out brawl for our LIVES, and you're STILL complaining about NOT being able to FACE someone? Then why don't you go look in a mirror? You'll find an UGLY enough face there!" I finished triumphantly, not caring that my last few remarks made little sense in regards to the statement they were answering.

"Well, actually," Kazu cut in as we both glared at him, "I sent one of my summons to the Hokage over in the Leaf Village with a message that we encountered trouble and that we'd be late!"

I grinned toothily at him and Yumi said, "Wow Kazu! That was actually smart!"

"I know!" he crowed gleefully. "Ha HAA! I win!" he laughed.

"And he's back to his regular self," I put in.

"Yep," Yumi agreed. "Say, do you know if there are any cute guys over there?"

As I answered in the negative, I overheard Washi saying, "And THAT's why I thank my lucky stars that I'm not a girl."

"I think SOMEONE's a little gender confused!" I smirked. "EVERYONE knows that the geniuses of the Mist Village have four girls, me, Yumi, Kaida, and Washi, and one boy: Deki!"

"Hey, what about me?" Kazu protested.

"Sorry Kazu, but it's also a known fact that you aren't human, and non-humans can't be boys or girls. But don't worry, you ARE a male."

"Phew, that's good to know!" Kazu exclaimed with a beaming smile.

"That's not fair!" Washi whined.

"I know!" Yumi said. "If Kazu's not human, then Deki can't be either!"

"Yeah, that's true," Kaida added.

"Even _I_ think that's right!" Deki shouted.

"If Deki's a boy, then I should be too," Kazu stated.

"Hey, hey, HEY! What about me?" Washi yelled.

Everyone looked at him for a second, then we all turned right back around and started talking again.

"Hmmph. Fine!" Washi pouted.

The rest of us laughed and Yumi went back next to him and patted his head. "Aww, is Washi-Washi feeling left out?" Washi swatted her hand away and snickered when Deki ran into a low branch while looking back at Washi and Yumi.

"FUCK!" Deki yelled.

"DON'T SWEAR!" I smacked the back of his head.

"Wait, isn't that the symbol of the Ninja Village in the Fire country?" Washi said in disbelief when we spotted the sign over the entrance.

"Yeah," Deki said calmly. "Also known as the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The birthplace of the Fire jutsus, the Sharingan and the Byakugan, and birthplace of the legendary Sannin, as well as the container of the nine-tailed demon," Deki told us.

"I guess we went farther than we thought when we were running from those psychopathic rogue ninja," Yumi thought aloud.

We jumped from branch to branch in silence, each one of us reflecting on the leg of the journey behind us, and thinking about the part of our lives that lay ahead of us in the unfamiliar village. That is, until the silence was broken by Washi perking up his nose and exclaiming, "Do I smell ramen?"

We laughed at him until we heard another voice chuckling nearby. "Yup. That's good ol' Ichiraku's, home of the best ramen in the world," the somewhat high, husky voice informed us.

We raced for the gates, then spun around, forming a tight circle, before Kazu demanded, "Who are you? Show yourself!"

"That would be _yourselves_," a laidback voice drawled. "Why are people so troublesome?"

A rustle of leaves made their presence known, and four little _kids_ appeared and made a circle around us.

I fearlessly looked, well, down, because the kid in front of me was actually shorter than me. I first saw a splotch of yellow and a few spots of blue. I blinked and it cleared out. The guy standing in front of me had bright yellow hair, and a bright orange jumpsuit, along with a pair of strange green goggles, and he looked around the age of nine or ten, just like my own younger brother. _Great. Just great._ I looked up again, just in time to see his mouth open.

"Who are you clowns?" the kid asked defensively.

And of course, Kazu just HAD to speak up. "We're ninja!" he said, not noticing the glare I gave him as I turned to glare at him. I saw Washi to my right, Yumi to my left, Kaida directly behind me, Deki next Yumi, and Kazu next to Washi, and all of us, excluding Kazu of course, looked like we were thinking the same things: _Okay, one, you DON'T answer a rhetorical question, number two, it's a stinkin' kid, you don't have to answer his question, and number three, I think it's kinda obvious. Remember? We have these things called headbands that show our NINJA alliances._

"We've got nothing to say to you, kid," Washi snapped suspiciously.

"Hrm." A bored looking boy stood in front of Deki and Yumi. Interestingly enough, his hair was pulled back into a ponytail that looked quite like a pineapple. Pineapple-hair-kid started talking again, saying, "They're from the Mist, they don't look threatening… Chuunin Exams?"

Yumi nodded once.

"Late team?" the boy drawled out.

Yumi nodded again. The boy standing in front of her and Deki looked up to the cloudy sky, sighing. "How troublesome…"

"Wait, these kids are from the Mist Village?" the kid in front of me asked cluelessly.

"Yes, Naruto, you idiot!" the pink-haired girl in front of Washi said through gritted teeth before throwing a punch that could've easily blasted the kid, who was evidently named Naruto, through several trees, had she put more force into it. But no, Naruto simply ended up with a large red fist mark on the side of his face.

"Sakura-chaaaaaaan…" he whined, reminding me of Washi for some odd reason. "I just couldn't believe that _these_ weak looking guys could possibly be ready for the Exams!"

I scoffed. He had no idea of how ready we were. Many years ago, graduation required young children to be pitted against each other in a fight of life and death. Then Zabuza Momochi came along and wiped out over 100 other students on his own. From then on, children were teamed up from their sixth and seventh years of age according to skill level and whose traits would compliment who else's.

For example, my strength complimented my two teammates' not-so-strength, Deki's logic went well with Kazu and I's ability to follow orders, and Kazu's speed balanced off Deki and I's not-so-speed. On top of that, I was a genjutsu specialist, as well as knowledgeable in healing, Deki had a great intellect and store of jutsu, and Kazu was very talented in taijutsu. We balanced each other out.

Now these kids who showed talent would train together in those teams, then have to pass a strenuous and life-threatening series of trials to move on. We had passed these trials, at the youngest ages recorded for these passing requirements, and were allowed to go on this 'mission,' the mission of dominating the Chunnin Exams, of course.

But seeing as how this Naruto kid was an idiot, I smirked and decided to have a little fun, and hopefully give the little brat a scare. I quickly dashed into a tree, then perched on a branch just above and behind the confused boy.

"Hey, where did that one girl go?" he asked with a bewildered look on his face. His eyes flitted over to Yumi, who had a puzzled look on her face, then he quickly clarified, "No, not you, the other weak looking one!" Yumi rolled her eyes and turned back around.

I took advantage of this distraction to swiftly pull out a kunai, then softly dropped behind the blond kid, quickly holding his hands together in a tight, bone-breaking grip behind his back with my left hand, then using my right to hold the kunai to his neck. "Never underestimate your potential opponents," I growled. "If I were an enemy, you'd be dead." I took a glance at the kid with the dark black hair and annoyed expression. You'd think that he had seen this happen many times.

Naruto muttered, "So maybe you're not a weakling," reluctantly under his breath.

"Shikamaru," the pink-haired girl, Sakura, as Naruto called her, said. "Who are they again?"

"Shinobi from the Mist Village. They're here for the Chunnin Exams… troublesome ninja…" Pineapple-hair-kid, now known as Shikamaru evidently, said.

Deki spoke up suddenly, as if just recalling something. "Nara Shikamaru. User of Shadow Control jutsus. Haruno Sakura. An excellent student with book smarts but no proficiency in the field. Uzumaki Naruto, class clown with a record of juvenile pranks and associated offenses." Deki recited all of this with his eyes closed, as if he was reading a page of a book from memory.

"Ha, Shikamaru, they know what I'm all about even over there in the Mist!" Naruto crowed, completely oblivious to the fact that I was still capable of ending his life with a simple twitch of my hand.

"Tomoko, you can put your kunai down. These are friends. They are of no harm," Deki said nonchalantly.

"They're kids. Of course they're of no harm." I let the arm with the kunai fall loosely to my side and propped my other elbow onto Naruto's head. He scowled up, annoyed, but grinned impishly after a second.

"Tch," the dark-haired kid scoffed.

"What's his problem?" I whispered to Naruto.

"The prick thinks he's so much better than everyone else," Naruto pouted, quite loudly.

Overhearing, although he'd have to have been deaf not to, Sasuke scoffed again and turned away, refusing to look at Naruto, who stuck his tongue out at him.

"This is the first time any of us have gone outside of the walls of Konoha. It's like a field trip!" Naruto exclaimed. "But Sasuke's being pissy about it."

"Naruto, language," a voice warned darkly. A man with brown hair and a scar across the bridge of his nose stepped out from the trees. "You kids are here for the Chuunin Exams?" he clarified. I nodded. "Very well. Just go through the gates and tell the two guys sitting there that you're here for the Exams, and do what they say. And if you find them slouching or looking bored, tell them that Iruka told them straighten up or else."

"Or else what, Iruka-sensei?" Naruto wondered aloud. It seemed to me that this kid wasn't exactly the sharpest kunai in the pouch. I smiled amusedly, taking my elbow off of Naruto's head.

"Or I'll kick their asses, that's what," 'Iruka-sensei' growled darkly.

"Iruka-sensei! How come you get to swear and I don't?" Naruto cried out.

"Tch. Usuratonkachi," the dark-haired kid muttered derogatorily.

"YOU FUCKING JERK!"

"LANGUAGE, Naruto! While what Sasuke said wasn't nice, that doesn't give _you_ permission to use strong language!" With that, Iruka smacked Naruto upside the head.

"Oww…"

Seizing the chance, my team and Yumi's team bolted for the gates. Along the way, Deki filled us in on the dark-haired kid, Sasuke.

"Uchiha Sasuke. Top of his class, considered a genius. Of the formerly prestigious, but now fallen, Uchiha clan, known for the Sharingan."

We finally entered through Konoha's gates.

_Uchiha, huh?_


	8. Ch 8: Settling In

Ch. 8: Settling In

* * *

We stopped at the station at the side of the road. The two men were, indeed, slouching. Giggling mischievously, Yumi henged into a spitting image of Iruka, then walked up to the table, slamming her hand down on it. "Just _what_ do you think you're doing?" she growled in perfect imitation of Iruka's voice. The two men jumped in fear and started stuttering.

"Uh-uh-uh… hi?" one of the men tried. With a 'poof' Iruka disappeared and it was just Yumi again. She grinned impishly.

"Hi! Nanami Mayumi, here for the Chuunin Exams!"

"Nanami…" the first man repeated, bewildered.

"…Mayumi?" the second man finished, equally bewildered.

"Aren't you supposed to be recording who enters and stuff?" I asked.

"Oh, um… SHIT!" the first man yelled.

"RIGHT!" the second man said, realizing what I meant.

"DAMMIT!" the first man shouted.

"Iruka's gonna kill us…" they whimpered in unison. Then they became all business. The first one pointed at Deki.

"Who are you?"

"Shimi. Shimi Hideki," he replied coldly.

"Awww… is Deki-kun a little shy?" Yumi cooed. I rolled my eyes at her. "Hey, once again, since you probably didn't catch it the first time, my name is Nanami Mayumi, surname Nanami, given name Mayumi, and this is my best bud Kaida!" she said motioning across the table. In a semi-whisper, she added, "You don't want to get her angry. She's a Sou—she has a family of people involved in killing—her dad's an executioner and her uncle's an assassin. And _they_ were the ones who trained her!" Leigha started fingering the hilt of her katana, where it was now casually hooked around her waist instead of strapped across her back in its battle-ready placement. I laughed at the flickers of fear that passed through the eyes of the two men.

"You're one to talk!" Washi interjected. "You almost killed me that one time when I accidentally broke that one ice sculpture of yours!"

"It wasn't just 'one' ice sculpture, that was the TENTH one, and it was for Kaida's birthday!" Yumi retorted.

"So what- it's still just an ice sculpture," Washi said noncommitally.

"_Just_ an ice sculpture? DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH EFFORT-"

"DOES IT REALLY LOOK LIKE I CARE ABOUT-"

"YOU WOULD NEVER BE ABLE-"

"WHAT IF I DON'T-"

The two of them shouted at each other, yelling at the same time with no regard to our eardrums.

"This must get annoying," the second man commented as Washi and Yumi turned up the volume and continued bickering.

"You have no idea of the HALF of it," Deki grumbled, talking over the noisy fighting of the two said opponents. "That one right there is the worst." He jerked his head in my direction.

"Hi!" I said cheerfully. "Thank you Deki, it's so nice to know you care! I'm Riku Tomoko! Surname Riku, given name Tomoko!"

"You don't want to get HER angry or annoyed either!" Kazu practically shouted in a sad attempt to whisper. "She's frickin' strong!"

The first man flinched. "So you pretty much are in the danger of death or serious injury whenever you're around any of those three?" he summarized with a whimper.

Said three of us smiled sheepishly while Kazu and Washi nodded vigorously.

"I think we can sympathize with your pain," the first man said.

"So, it's Nanami Mayumi, Sou Kaida, Shimi Hideki, Warami Washi, Nisi Kazuyuki, and Riku Tomoko," Deki clarified.

"Okay," the first man said, "you are free to go."

We walked down the main road into the village.

"Bye!" Yumi called cheerfully, turning back around to wave.

"Now, for the next order of business: finding a place to stay!" I exclaimed.

A kind, elderly woman pointed us in the direction of an inn, and we hurried there in hopes of securing a room. Upon arriving, we rented out two rooms: one for us girls, and another for the guys. We trooped upstairs and dropped off our few supplies and our change of clothes, handily stored in a single scroll for each person.

After Kaida, Yumi and I freshened up, we knocked on the door to the guys' room, which was across the hall. Kazu opened it and we saw Washi sprawled out and napping on one of the two beds, Deki reading in an armchair, and Kazu was holding a pack of playing cards in his hand.

"Great!" Yumi said, spotting the deck of cards. "Can we play?"

Kazu answered in the affirmative and asked Kaida and I if we wanted to play. Kaida said yes, but I declined the offer, and decided to explore town a bit and make some friends.

"See ya!" I said as I turned to leave. After a second thought, I shouted back to Deki, "Oh, and don't worry, I'll look for a prank prop shop _for_ Washi!"

A snicker came back from behind the door in reply, where Deki was now probably planning Washi's ultimate demise. I went out, then strolled along the streets, soaking in the sights and sounds. I wasn't paying attention when I bumped into a solid chest.

"Who are you?"

I froze, shocked.

"I said, who are you?" the same deep voice asked.

I quickly recovered from my shock and without skipping a beat I answered, "Hi. My name is Riku Tomoko," while looking up at him from where I had instinctively stepped back after the collision. He had long black hair gathered into a loose ponytail, and pronounced tear duct-like lines running from the inner corners of his eyes to down by his nose. He looked like he was fourteen or fifteen. For some strange reason, he reminded me of the Uchiha kid.

"Oh, I apologize!" I said quickly, realizing I was being rude.

"Don't worry about it," he said in an emotionless voice, one that was almost cold. I didn't push it any further, not wishing to make a scene.

My thoughts were interrupted by a loud shriek, then high-pitched giggling coming from my left. I looked over and saw two girls on either side of a boy a bit above my height, and all three looked about my age. They were obviously flirting, and the girls looked to me like the popular, preppy, wannabe type of girl, extremely rude and incredibly annoying.

One of the girls, the one with brown hair who was chewing on gum as obnoxiously and disgustingly as a cow chews its cud, called out loudly, intending for me to hear. "Who's that bitch over there, gabbing with that hottie like she's all that?" She added, "Hey sexy!" when she saw the man's passive, unblinking stare turn to her. She winked at him, and I turned away, absolutely repulsed. My feelings didn't hurt a bit; it was only coming from an insecure, backboneless crowd pleaser, after all.

Instead I gritted my teeth and muttered to the man standing in front of me, "Is it a bad thing if one moment you feel happy and on top of the world, but the next you feel sadistic and homicidal, and you want to torture, then kill everyone who has ever annoyed you?"

"Forget it," he said, but not in a rude way. His voice and dark gray eyes then seemed to hold a touch of amusement. "If you did that, would anyone be left in the world?"

I thought about it, then answered, "I guess not." I smiled. "I'm sorry, but you really remind of someone."

"Really? Who?"

"This probably sounds really stupid, but you really look like this kid named Uchiha Sasuke for some reason." I looked downward to the ground.

His hands tensed up, just slightly, before he calmly said, "That's interesting. Well, he is my younger brother, after all."

I looked up in surprise. "Really?"

"Yes. He's a brat, don't you think?"

I nodded vigorously, grinning.

"I think I'll call you Makimi," he said suddenly, and quite randomly.

"What does that mean?" I asked, hoping to understand the reason for the name, and for the timing of its 'presentation.'

"Genuine beauty." His eyes flickered in the direction of the two girls, plastered with makeup and orange with fake tanning, now being joined by their blonde (obviously dyed)-haired friend. I could actually see padding in her top.

I smiled, now understanding exactly what he meant. That smile turned into a mischievous smirk as I got an idea. "Say, Sasuke-brat's-older-brother, do you know of any parks or attractions around here that would be good to visit tonight?"

He smiled slightly, probably at my own mischievous grin. I could see the amusement in his expression and hear it in his voice as he answered, "Yes, there is a park that will have an open stage about two streets down. It'll open around seven this evening."

I grinned widely at him before bowing politely, saying, "Thank you again, Sasuke's-older-brother," then I turned to leave when he nodded.

While I walked away, I could feel two glares following me, informing me that I had two new enemies. But there another gaze, his gaze, watching me, but it wasn't as cold as before. It was softer, warmer, as if he was smiling, and it was by that that I could also tell that I had made a good friend.

"Hey, doesn't he look so hot? Especially since he's so tall, and so strong, and has the dark hair and those gorgeous green eyes!" I paused for a moment, very much annoyed by the girls' constant yammering.

I sent out a tendril of chakra and found a weak shelf above them, supporting a bucket of fish guts. Smirking to myself, I weakened the wood further. A second more, a crash, and the girls screeched as cold, smelly, slimy fish innards dumped down on their heads. I turned around to see the damage, then started walking again, laughing on the inside, a smirk firmly in place on the outside.

"Teach them to comment so loudly and rudely and so _high-pitched_ on guys' features when said guys are _clearly_ not interested…" I muttered under my breath. "Tall, strong, dark hair, gorgeous green ey—" I stopped in shock. "Green eyes?" _They were gray…_

I turned around to check one more time, but the man had disappeared.


	9. Ch 9: A Night Out

Ch. 9: A Night Out

* * *

"Hey guys!" I shouted as I burst into the room, barely able to contain my excitement.

"You seem excited," Deki said in a way that told me he was bored.

"You were messing with their BS game again, weren't you!" I accused.

"Oh yes, shoot me, I'm messing with them."

"You and your fucking mind reading. So fucking gay!" Washi muttered under his breath.

"Oh my fucking god! IT ONLY WORKS FROM LESS THAN A FOOT AWAY!" Deki shouted. "If I could read your mind, I would be able to see your cards by then! Anyway, you have Yumi on your team, and she can actually read facial expressions and body language without being closer than 12 inches to a person!"

"Sheesh, don't have a fucking cow!" Washi shot back.

I listened to their bickering for, oh, about, five seconds before pushing them apart and bellowing, "GUESS WHAT!"

"What!" they snapped back at me, impatient to start arguing again. Kazu 'escorted' Deki to one corner of the room while Yumi dragged Washi to the opposite one.

"First of all, I ban swearing from this room! And second of all, I made plans for tonight!" I announced proudly (1). "And it's a secret where we're going! Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to use the bathroom."

I walked across the hallway to the bathroom in the girls' room, did my business, then flopped on a random bed, thinking. An inspiration hit me, so I picked up a pen and grabbed a slim notebook from the pouch hooked to my forehead protector, which was tied around my waist. I scribbled down whatever came to mind, and an hour and a half later, I was finished.

I strode to the other room and pushed open the door. "Hey guys, get ready, we're going OUT tonight!"

"Where?" was the immediate response.

"I already told you. It's a surprise! We're leaving in a few minutes."

"Got it!"

Four minutes later, we met outside of our rooms in the hallway.

I adjusted my hip pouch, now much lighter, containing only a small scroll and the small notebook, then said, "Follow me!"

We raced across the rooftops until I heard the music, singing, and the thumping beat, then dropped to the ground. "SURPRISE!"

"Wow," Yumi said.

"Nice," Kaida commented.

"Cool!" Kazu exclaimed.

"Shit," Deki swore.

"NOOOO!" Washi screamed.

"Oh yes," I smiled darkly. "Come on, let's go in!"

Yumi ended up dragging Washi in through the gates by the collar of his shirt, and we all sat down on either of a pair of facing benches. The park was a large expanse of green grass, insulated from the cool breezes by trees growing thickly around its edges.

I spotted that same cow-like gum-gnawing girl from before, as well as her black-haired companion, and she was still chewing obnoxiously on a piece of gum. The girl standing next to her, the one with the black hair, had on way too much makeup, as well as a flashy low-cut shirt.

"Hey," Deki said, "does that haircut look familiar to you?"

I looked in the direction he pointed, and sure enough, it was the pineapple ponytail, the bright yellow spikes, the bright pinkette, and… and the irritated expression. They were surrounded by a bunch of other short people, and Iruka was in the middle of the crowd. Looked like it was another field trip. Naruto looked over and spotted us, then waved hi at a furious speed. I caught him glancing at the entrance gate, and saw a team or two of other genin our age entering in. I noticed a sign, then read aloud to the others. "'Rally for all Genin and Genin Teams'. Looks like we chose a good day to come!"

"You mean _you_ chose it?" Washi muttered under his breath.

I ignored him, then started snickering when some girls who looked only a few years older than us passed by our table and started patting Washi on the head like he was an eight year old, younger than Naruto and his friends. He did look like one. I smirked evilly, then said, "Hey Washi, why don't you go upstage and sing something? They can't touch you when you're up there!"

To my surprise, he actually made his way up to the stage, then told the DJ what song to play. As he started, I noticed a baby grand piano at the left of the stage. _Perfect._

As Washi started 'singing'… well, let's just say that most people weren't too appreciative of… umm… how do I explain this… loud, tuneless yelling set to a blasting, heavy metal background… yeah… and you could tell that it spectacularly sucked because we were in a park and people on the streets were sending him dirty looks. Sheesh…

While we soothed our bleeding and throbbing ears, Yumi aided us by singing a soft, melodious Japanese lullaby. Washi actually started snoring in the middle of it, so of course I had to smack him, but other than that, Yumi's performance went well. We noticed that a lot of Naruto's friends had come by, and we listened to a duet sung by Sakura and a clear blue-eyed, white-blond-haired girl named Ino. It started very pretty and was going well until Ino accidentally bumped into Sakura, then the performers exploded with cries of 'INO-PIG!' and 'FOREHEAD!'

I finally decided to go up. I took a deep breath and was about to mount the stage when the two girls from before shoved past me and announced they were going to sing a song for Hitoshi. I saw a boy with dark brown hair and dark skin wink back at the two beasts at the mike, and assumed he was Hitoshi when they waved back.

"Yeah, so my name is Kagami," the brown haired gum chewer stated.

"And I'm, like, Kohaku," the other girl with black hair and too much makeup said.

The two started singing at ear splittingly high pitches, which were spaced out with the sound of obnoxious chewing and breathing. During this 'song', the pages of sticker nametags that were being passed around stopped at our benches, and we all filled one out and stuck it on. When the Fearsome Twosome finished, the people outside the park were giving them even dirtier looks than they did to Washi. That was an accomplishment.

I quickly went upstage, shook my head at the expectant DJ, and took a deep breath.

"Hello everybody, I'm Tomoko, and I would like to sing you all a song I wrote myself," I said into the mike at center stage. Pulling out the notebook from where it was secured in my hip pouch, I walked over to the baby grand and adjusted the floor mike. I set the notebook on the music stand and opened it to the right page, then I ran my fingers over the sleek black and ivory keys. My fingers began pushing the keys, then I became lost in the music.

_A scraggly tree_

_Barely survives_

_A solitary cloud_

_Floats through the sky_

_A single person_

_Surrounded by others._

_But he's still alone…_

_A lonely flower_

_Grows in a field_

_A lonesome star_

_Dully twinkles and shines_

_And the moon stands alone._

_She stands alone…_

_Just give her a smile_

_A simple greeting won't take a while_

_It could make all the difference to him_

_Or mean the world to her_

_And if you find yourself standing alone_

_Or if you see another with a heart like stone_

_A simple hello can be the spark_

_That sets the world on fire_

_A warmth that never tires_

_Pulls them out of the darkness_

_And gloom of their souls…_

_You can be the one…_

I continued to sing, going through all the verses, then I softly ended with one more lasting note. I opened my eyes. And I found everyone staring at me with opened mouths. I took it as shock, for Deki had put down his book, Yumi was wide eyed, and Washi had even gone so far as to smack the person next to him out of boredom(2)! I grabbed the notebook then ran to the mike at center stage, said a quick thank you, then dashed back to my seat, willing for someone to start talking. I sat down, then slouched, shrinking down on the bench, then I asked Yumi out of the corner of my mouth, "Can I borrow Washi? I want to burn my notebook."

"What!" Yumi cried. "Why! That was frickin' awesome!"

"But, then, why does everyone look horrified?" I insisted.

"There's a thing called awe," Deki said after finally recovering.

"Oh." I blushed, from both my embarrassment, and also from all the stares giving their attention to me. I sat uncomfortably as the stares only intensified.

"What's your problem, bitch?" Kagami shouted suddenly, flipping me up. "What are you trying to do, get our boyfriends, you slut? Fucking crawl back under that rock you can from, you ugly bitch!" (3)

Her words reverberated in the stillness of the park, echoing back and forth. When it finally died out, I whispered to my companions, "I'm gonna go walk around for a bit." The five of my friends nodded, then I slipped through of the deathly silence still reigning over the area, into the cool, crisp evening breeze blowing around the trees.

I ran blindly, around to the back of the building, jumped onto the roof, then leapt across a few other roofs before slowing down and stopping, leaning against a third story attic wall. I shut my eyes, then opened them after a minute or so of trying to calm my thoughts. I looked up to see a short, blond, wavy-haired boy of my age standing in front of me.

_You have been chosen…_

The figure looked straight at me with deep blue, piercing eyes, before dissolving into a cloud of mist.

* * *

(1) Here strikes Tomoko's policy of no cursing for her or people around her.

(2) From Tomoko's perspective, of course. In actuality, the guy next to Washi was snoring, so he hit him to wake him up. Ironic, no?

(3) And of course, Kagami cannot be civil and knows that Tomoko is better and easier to like than she is, so she makes up any excuse to embarrass Tomoko. Including the groundless accusation of trying to steal their boyfriends, which, in actuality, Tomoko could care less about.


	10. Ch 10: Memories

Ch. 10: Memories

* * *

I gasped as I jerked my eyes open. _Wait, open? They already were!_ I realized with a feeling of stupidity that I had been dreaming_._ But even though it was only a dream, I couldn't shake off the feeling of a foreboding life-death urgency. And who was that boy? I had never met him before! But somehow, I knew I'd be seeing him again sometime soon.

"Tomoko, you okay?" A voice interrupted my thoughts.

"Tsubasa?" The name suddenly slipped off my tongue. _What the heck? Where did that come from?_ "I mean, Kazu?" I corrected myself after seeing who it really was. "What are you doing out here?"

"Well, you were gone for a while," he explained while chewing on a straw. "Yumi wanted someone to check on you to see if you were alright, but she was trying to lose Washi, who downed one too many sodas and was attempting to flirt with her and she was sure he'd follow her and bother you if she came, and Deki was having a debate with that one lazy kid with the weird hair. Kaida was comparing weaponry with one of Iruka's teacher aides, she was ten or eleven, I think her name was Eleven (1) or something, and with all the sharp and explosive objects around them, I don't think it would have been safe to disturb Kaida. So she, Yumi, sent me out here."

"Oh."

We stayed there for a while, me sitting with my back against the wall, and him standing in front of me, but a little off to the side a few feet away. I barely noticed when he slid down to sit next to me.

"Hey, you remember that one day when we were five? The day that—"

"The day that I met you," I finished for him. "How could I forget?"

* * *

_A small girl of five stood, wiping her eyes in a corner. She had no friends; no one liked her. They called her a nerd, but said she was stupid at the same time. She was an outcast. Her mother said she was a clever mastermind, but no one else even knew her, other than as the 'freaky Asian girl'. At times she wanted to curl up and go away, it was these times that she would run. Just run, and she usually ended up in the one place that mattered to her. The girl was there then._

_She sat in a little room she had slowly grown together herself, using her own unnamed jutsu. Flowers, plants in general, made her happy. They made her feel hopeful, pretty, useful. On that particular day, she had run to her secret refuge a little away from one of the surrounding towns by the Mist Village after the popular girls had made fun of her. She had finally discovered one of the rare flowers that was her favorite, but they started insulting her, calling her an 'ugly flower lover.' Then, right before her eyes, they stomped on the flower, crushing it, snuffing out its life. There she sat, still sniffling._

_A boy who seemed the same age as she was suddenly stumbled into the room. "I'm lost," he sniffed. She nodded, then took his hand to lead him back to town. She showed him her favorite flower from another secret spot where she had replanted all the flowers she had found, then had even picked a blossom to show him. They continued on their way, but right as they were about to enter, the same girls and their male counterparts had popped out and were about to beat up the boy next to the small girl. They called him names, worse than what they called her. She got angry._

_Her eyes narrowed into dark slits, and the flower in her hand shriveled and turned to ashes. She reached out a hand to a large, sturdy, ancient tree, moving it to her will. The branches grabbed at the offenders, snatching for them. The bullies took one more look, then ran. The two left reached town without any more trouble, and the boy ran off._

_A few days later, she was back, crying again. Her eyes were closed, tears coming out, and her body shook with silent sobs. An arm found its way around her, hugging her. It stayed there, its owner waiting patiently for the girl to stop crying. She did stop, and looked up out of red, puffy eyes to see who her visitor was. It was him again. Except this time, he was holding a flower, exactly like her favorite one, with five teardrop-shaped petals, except it wasn't snowy white, like her favorite usually was. It was a deep, blood red. Her favorite color._

_She sat with an open mouth as he put it in her hand and closed her fingers around it. But right before he ran off again, she absorbed some of his chakra. As she watched him sprinting back in the direction of the village, she pushed his chakra into the flower to keep it alive._

_The boy in the girl became best friends after that. The boy was named Kazu. And the girl's name—Tomoko._

* * *

I opened my eyes after the few seconds-in-reality memory, then smiled at the boy sitting next to me.

"Hey, Kazu, from that day, there's something I've been meaning to give you. Close your eyes."

I took out the small, miniature scroll, opened it, then sent out a tiny tendril of chakra to release the item stored inside. After a small cloud of fog, two identical deep red flowers lay on the inked paper of the scroll. I gingerly picked up the two flowers and rolled up the scroll, putting it away, then I whispered 'thank you' before turning and running swiftly, leaving one of the crimson blossoms in my place.

A flower for my first friend.

* * *

(1) Yep, it's Ten-ten!


	11. Ch 11: New Friends and Old Enemies

Ch. 11: New Friends and Old Enemies

* * *

I stood next to Yumi back by our bench in the park, laughing hysterically after dropping an ice block, compliments of Yumi, down the back of Washi's shirt as revenge on him for attempting to flirt with Yumi. I spotted Kazu wandering by with a slightly confused look on his face and the flower in his hands. I ran over to him and saw his eyes flickering up to where a crimson bloom had replaced my sky-blue headband.

"Hey, Kazu, what's the flower for?" Kaida asked.

"Yeah, you got a girlfriend?" Washi snickered.

"No, it's a gift from a friend, oh smart one," I said for Kazu while kicking Washi in the shin. "Oh, right!" I said suddenly, grabbing Kazu's wrist and half-leading, half-dragging him to where a group of shinobi our age were clumped.

"Is that your boyfriend?" a boy with longish dirty blond hair asked. I held up Kazu's wrist where I was gripping it and showed the boy the white and red marks from where I had pretty much strangled his thin wrist, before dropping his arm altogether.

"Yeah, I'd definitely treat my boyfriend like that, Ginjiro." I rolled my eyes. "What is with you guys and guessing about dating first? Anyway, this is Tsumi, short for Natsumi, and Kazu, short for Kazuyuki," I said, motioning towards a girl slighter shorter than Kazu, who was pretty tall by the way, and who had wavy blonde hair that went three-quarters of the way down her back.

"Nice to meet you, Kazu!" Natsumi chirped happily.

I introduced him to all of my new friends, one by one. Asa was a girl, an inch or two taller than me with brownish hair streaked with natural golden highlights. Reiko was Asa's cousin, and she had short-above-the-shoulder length brown hair, and was an inch taller than Asa.

When I finished introducing Kazu to all of my new friends, a girl slightly taller than Reiko suddenly appeared between Natsumi and another girl named Nozomi, who, unlike the others, did not have the symbol of the Leaf Village on her headband. She was from Suna, also known as the Village Hidden in the Sand.

The girl who had just made her way over to us had wide hazel eyes, light brown shoulder-length hair, and was shaking her hands wildly. "Hey, are you doing introductions! I'm Haruhi!" she went on without pausing for an answer.

"Hi, I'm Tomoko, and this is my best bud Kazu!" I informed her.

"Haruhi, CALM DOWN. Deep breaths," Natsumi commanded, and Haruhi soon stopped hyperventilating. "Well, anyway, your song was amazing. Did you really write it yourself?" I nodded. "That's really cool! Well, see you around."

"Yeah, the same to you." I turned to find Kazu looking at someone across the park. I looked in the direction he was and spotted a girl with blonde hair and blue eyes talking to her friend, completely unaware that Kazu was staring at her. Yumi and Deki joined us.

"Oh. My. God," Yumi gasped. "It can't be—"

"But it is!" Deki exclaimed. "That's her!"

"Who's her?" I was officially confused, and I was freaking out—Deki losing his cool was never a good sign.

The single word that Kazu uttered brought me back to those days when Kazu was my only friend, when he had just introduced me to his other friends, to Yumi, who soon became my next best friend, and Deki, who also became a friend of mine. But there was another girl as well in the picture of all of the Mist kids, one attempting to push me out for her own unknown selfish reasons. One who had wanted it all for herself and was only starting with me. The girl who Kazu had been crushing on. But the same girl who hated him.

"…Miki…"

My confusion slowly disappeared and my facial expressions smoothed out to the indifferent, passive look that always adorned my face whenever I dealt with or thought about girls like her. _Miki… Why her?_ That one day, when I first met Kazu—I had been crying because one girl had been making fun of me. That girl had been Miki. Then one day, she and her twin brother had just disappeared. Rumor had it that she and her brother, Kohei, had always lived with only their mother, but their parent had died in a freak accident and they were going to leave for Suna to stay with their father.

I was glad to finally be rid of Miki, but I was sad that Kohei was leaving too. Kohei was nice, unlike his sister, and he and Kazu had been inseparable. Except for that one day that was so important to me, Kohei had gone home to pack his stuff. Kazu was with him, but was distracted by a beautiful flower, the same one he gave to me a few days later. He got lost on the way to Kohei's house, and ended up at my hideout.

Once the twins had left, no one knew that it was Miki who had made me cry. I thought about it often, but it wasn't until Deki attempted, and failed, to make me feel better that I realized about his mind-reading abilities, that he knew my secret, and that he could actually be really caring. But unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you looked at the situation, he could read my thoughts now as well.

"Tomoko, you want to go back to the inn?" Deki asked. I shook my head, but thought better of it when I saw both Deki and Yumi look worriedly at Kazu.

"On second thought, why don't we all go back to the inn? Tomorrow is going to be the first day of the Exams. We should rest."

Four heads nodded back at me, but one stayed transfixed on a single spot. "Kazu, let's go," I said softly, gently touching his elbow.

He jumped in surprise, then shook his head. "No?"

He nodded his head, then stopped in confusion before saying, "Yeah. Let's leave."

We all gathered up our things, then said a quick goodbye to all of our new friends before jumping back to the inn, swiftly running over the roofs in the cool nighttime air. We traveled in silence, and once at the hallway between our rooms, we promptly split up into boys and girls—the guys going to their room and us girls to ours. Yumi unlocked the door and the three of us walked into the large room. I immediately sunk down into an armchair, caring about etiquette as I slouched with my knees together. Not. Kaida threw her katana onto the bed she had claimed. Yumi flopped onto the other bed, sighing. She was the third, and last person who knew my secret.

I made no move to unwrap the sleeping mat that would be my bed for the next few weeks, but strode to the bathroom instead after grabbing my pajamas. I locked the door behind me, then proceeded to change into the loose T-shirt and long flannel pants. I brushed my teeth and rinsed my face, then folded up my worn clothing before exiting the small room. When I came out, Yumi went in.

I tossed my clothes into a surprisingly neat pile on top of my stuff with my right hand, fingering the flower I had taken out of my hair with my left. And I thought about the person who held the flower's twin. That him who had befriended me when I was friendless. _Kazu… why did it have to be her?_

My thoughts were interrupted when Deki dropped lightly onto the balcony connected to the glass door in the wall opposite the door. I looked up to find that Kaida and Yumi were already asleep, that I had been thinking for longer than I had realized. I looked at Deki questioningly. 'Follow me,' he mouthed through the glass panes. I nodded, then slipped outside. I jumped after him when he landed on the roof of the building next door. We traveled around until we were standing on the balcony connected to his, Washi's and Kazu's room. "Was that really necessary?" I asked him quietly.

"Can you talk to him?" Deki asked just as quietly, motioning towards Kazu and avoiding the question. I hesitated, then nodded after seeing the worried look on Deki's face. "Thanks." I nodded again.

I stood in a corner slightly sheltered from the night breezes that were turning from cool to cold. Deki slipped inside. A minute later Kazu stepped out. "You can't sleep either?" I nodded.

We stood there silently, and I noticed he held the flower in his hand. It was slightly drooped. I sighed, then said, "Follow me. I have something I need to tell you." Without waiting for a response, I turned and went toward the outskirts of the village, blindly traveling in whatever direction seemed right. I finally stopped in a small clearing in the forest surrounding the village.

"What I need to tell you about is our flowers. You remember that day when you gave me that flower? Well, before you left," I continued without letting him answer, "when your hand was on mine, I kinda accidentally absorbed some of your chakra before you ran off. Then I thought the flower looked kind of wilted so I automatically put some chakra into it but it was actually from the hand that had your chakra so your chakra went in instead and then I noticed that when you were sad it went droopy and when you were happy it stood straight up and when you were awake it was opened and when you were asleep it was closed and—"

"It pretty much tells you how I'm feeling?" Kazu interrupted me as I gasped for breath after my long rambling speech. I nodded. "So the one you gave me is connected to you, I'm guessing?" I nodded again. _He's a lot smarter then we give him credit for…_ "That is, like, soooo totalllllyyyyy COOOOOOLLLLL!" _Never mind, I take that back._

After that thought I started laughing, and Kazu stood there looking confused. I slowly calmed down from the awkwardness of laughing alone, and then there was no more sound other than the wind blowing through the trees.

"Hey, Tomoko…" I jumped at the unexpected noise.

"Yeah?"

"You remember Miki?"

"…Yeah."

"Do you think she'll like me now?" he asked dreamily.

"Who knows?" I said nonchalantly, but the whole time, inside, I was screaming at him, telling him to move on, that he was too good for the likes of her. "She hated you!" The sentence escaped from my mouth before I could stop it.

"What?" Kazu said sharply. "What are you talking about?"

"Umm… never mind…" I muttered.

"Tell me."

"…"

"Tell me!"

"…"

"TELL—"

"ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO KNOW!"

"…"

"Well!"

"…Yes."

"Alright." I sighed deeply. "You know that day I met you? And how I was crying?"

"Yeah."

"Well…" I sighed again. "I never did tell you who it was, but I think you should know. It was Miki. And when I showed you the way back to town, and those kids started to tease you, and I got angry? She was perched in that tree next to us, cheering those idiots on. That's why I chose that tree in particular to use. She was in it and that's also why you heard a bit of a shriek when I moved the tree." I rushed it all out in one breath before breathing deeply and sighing yet again.

"It was… Miki?" Kazu asked in disbelief. "That explains why—but people can change, right?" he asked hopefully. I shook my head at him, rolling my eyes.

"You're such a blockhead."

"Heh. Wonder what Washi would say if I told him you were crying."

"You wouldn't."

"Why n—OW! What the fuck!" he yelped as he clutched the shin I had just kicked.

"Oh, and when I'm barefoot too! Wonder what Deki and Yumi would think if they saw a picture of you hopping up and down?" I teased Kazu, holding a detailed sketch of him doing that very thing (1).

"Hey, give me thaaat!"

"You'll have to catch me!" I sang tauntingly. I knew he was faster than me. But I wasn't about to admit it.

"You're on."

We raced back to the inn, and Kazu reached it far before I did, of course.

"I win. Give me it." I grudgingly handed him the sketch, then laughed as it 'poofed' back into a regular piece of paper. He shook his head in disbelief, yawned, then started walking into his room. "Whatever. See ya in the morning." He drew the curtains before plopping onto the mat on the floor. A few minutes later, back in my own room, I smiled at the crimson blossom that had just closed. I smiled contentedly before drifting off to sleep.

* * *

(1) Yeah, Tomoko did a henge or transformation jutsu on the paper. She can't draw that fast, and she definitely doesn't have that kind of foresight. XP


	12. Ch 12: The Exams Begin

Ch. 12: The Exams Begin!

* * *

"What! NOOOO!"

_It_ was here. The bane of my existence. The thorn that had been in my side for 11 whole years. _My brother_. I woke up in the morning and was about to go out to get breakfast when there was a knocking at the door. I went to get it, and there IT, I mean HE was. He was just standing there, but my whole world came crashing down with the next few sentences he spoke.

"Mom made me come with her." _Mom's here too? _"And she heard Miki was in town." _Oh no, she's going to get revenge for me! "_And she brought a bag of stuff you forgot and other stuff you need." _Groan… embarrassment is in my near future…_

"Hey, Minoru," I gritted out as calmly as possible, "can you run out and buy five oranges, six apples and three bananas?" I slipped a handful of cash into his hand.

"Yeah, sure. Do I get paid?"

"You can have the change. But MAKE SURE THEY ARE GOOD. Or else I'll force you to eat every last bit and then make you go out and get more with your OWN money."

"Got it."

As soon as he disappeared around the corner, I dashed across the hallway, barging into the guy's room, not worrying about knocking first or accidentally entering on an awkward scene. Deki would be nowhere to be seen, anyway, and Kazu would already be changed. Washi would still be sleeping, and I knew for a fact that he slept with clothes on. Don't ask. Please don't. But anyway, as the door slammed against the wall after I threw it open, I found I was right. I started bellowing.

"ALERT! ALERT! MY MOTHER IS IN THE VICINITY! No one, and I mean _NO ONE_, talks about the _her_(1) we met yesterday, or I will painfully stab you nearly to death with a DULL pencil, heal you a little, stab you half to death, heal you, stab you half to death again, over and over, until you DIE IN AGONY FROM BLOOD LOSS. GOT IT?"

"Umm… yeah… sure…" Washi mumbled, obviously lost.

I collapsed onto an armchair in their room, groaning. "Why did it have to be today? Ugh… SHIZ!" MY eyes popped open as soon as I remembered. "THE EXAMS!"

"SHIT!" Washi shouted.

"DAMN!" Kazu yelled.

"FUCK!" Deki swore.

"ASS! What did I miss?" Kaida interrupted.

"Tomoko's mom is here." Washi informed her and Yumi, who had just joined us.

"Oh, shit… no one talk about Miki," Yumi said, not noticing when I winced. "Oh, and avoid her tattling bro."

"What time do the Exams start?" Kazu asked.

"10:00." My brother entered the room with his arms full of ripe fruits. "And I'm making sure mom and I leave as soon as I get back. The people in this village are weird," he said, making a face.

"Thanks, Noru. Thank you SO much. Here's an extra coin or two." I dropped a few pieces of change into his hand in exchange for the armload of fruits. "Well, dig in everybody! It's 8:30, we have an hour to eat and get ready, then we're leaving! Don't want to get lost!" I grabbed an apple. Deki picked up a banana, and Washi greedily hoarded a banana, two apples, and an orange. Kaida snagged an orange, and Yumi snatched a shiny apple. I put away the last three oranges for later after Kazu took out some crackers he had gotten the day before, and Kaida picked up an apple. Washi reached for another banana, but Deki interrupted him.

"Hey, Warami, don't get fat on us!"

We laughed, but on a more serious note, I added, "You mean on Yumi and Kaida. Starting at 10:00 this morning, we split up into our actual teams. But I have only one request. Washi, don't come near me. It looks really bad if you're short and you get injured, even accidentally, by someone even shorter than you."

We all laughed, even Washi, then we all separated to prepare our things for the Exams.

As soon I as I was in my room, I strapped the rest of my ninja gear on. My purple shirt, a v-neck, sleeveless on the right side and a long sleeve on the left with red stitching as a decoration, went over a ninja mail half-sleeved top and black, knee-length shorts, also with the red stitching. I secured my sash around my waist, then adjusted it, a seemingly delicate, but very sturdy gauzy material of the same color as my shirt. It was decorated with beads along the bottom weighing it down; the weighted beads could double as a chain. They were quite lethal, in fact. I tightened the strap of the shuriken and kunai pouch that was around my upper right thigh.

I then wrapped bandages around my right forearm, from just below my elbow to halfway up each finger. I tucked in a freshly sharpened stock of shuriken and kunai into the easily accessible outer pocket of the pouch around my thigh, then slipped in my medicinal plant notebook into the smaller main pocket. After a second thought, I left behind my songbook. I put the indigo silk headband into my hair, then tucked the stem of the crimson flower into the waistband of my shorts.

As the finishing touch to my weapon supply, I shoved in a pouch of rose seeds. I threaded my headband through the straps of my hip pouch, which was currently filled with scrolls, then I tied the headband around my waist, over the sash, securing the deep red blossom.

Pulling on my sandals, I strode out the door, meeting up promptly with Deki and Kazu. "Let's go." We walked downstairs, politely thanking our hostess, in case we failed to return, before continuing into the street. We easily located the building of the first trials, as all the genin we could see were headed in that direction. Upon arrival, we signed in and were waved on to a large room where seemingly all of the genin were gathered before the big event. Looking around anxiously, I relaxed when I spotted Yumi, Kaida and Washi. I scanned the room again, then smiled slightly when I saw Asa, Reiko, and Natsumi waving.

I jumped when Deki tapped on my shoulder. I spun around to look at him questioningly.

"What do you think about that character over there?" he asked. I looked in the direction he indicated and spotted a bulky guy, our age, seeming to be slightly taller than Kazu.

"He has the build of an earth-jutsu user," I commented.

"No, not him, _that_ guy! With the black hair!" I looked again and froze. It couldn't be… he looked like the guy from the dream! Sure, he had hair that was stick-straight and black, not wavy and blonde, and he had cold, calculating, black eyes instead of striking, warm, blue eyes, but his face was the same. Except on this guy, the features looked cold, and… evil. On the boy from the dream, it looked caring, yet strong. On the boy I was looking at, the facial characters looked malevolent, and, just, _Evil_. I brought myself out of my thoughts and turned to Deki, knowing I didn't need to say anything.

"I'd describe him the same way," Deki said.

Suddenly, a man stood at the front of the room, and with some volume-amplifying chakra use, he projected his voice throughout the room. "Come through this door for the first part of the Exams!" he bellowed. I nodded sharply at Deki and Kazu, making sure we stayed together.

The first section of the Exams was a written test. After listening to some guy I couldn't see (courtesy of the tall guy in front of me), I started once he said go. There were some mathematical word problems, and other such things of the sort. The three of us in our team were geniuses in more than one way; we excelled not only in skill, but also in smarts and intelligence. I whizzed through the test, only having to hesitate on some of the most difficult problems. I finished and looked up to find Deki sitting there looking bored, and Kazu chewing on his pen. I smirked as I watched the grown man in front of me struggle through an easier problem, while I leaned back and relaxed. Bored, I closed my eyes for a few minutes. When I opened them, the man who I couldn't see was talking. As the disembodied voice floated throughout the room, I heard a few words here and there, not really paying attention. Something about leaving, your team, chances, failing, and no chance.

I stopped listening and instead looked at Deki for the slightest sign of a response. Logic was his forte. He looked up and caught my attention, then made the smallest nod. I nodded back as I stood up. "We will be taking our leave." As we walked down to the door, I heard Yumi also getting up, presumably because of Deki and his logic. I heard many other chairs scraping against the floor as their occupants also stood up to exit. Leaning against the wall in the hallway, I noted with satisfaction that all of my new friends had followed, but I also found with annoyance that some of my new enemies had made their way out as well.

I looked up in surprise when the classroom door opened and one of the jounin from the room stepped out. He drew a deep breath, then said two words that changed our lives.

"You pass."

We all stood in silence, digesting the information.

"Yes!" I shouted, punching my fist into the air. I jumped between Kazu and Deki before putting my hands on their shoulders, jumping up and down, using them as supports. I yelled, "We passed! Be happy about it!" The last remark was pointed towards Deki who was still standing with an indifferent expression.

Kazu was starting to get excited and danced around before shouting, "YEAH!"

"Don't get so worked up," the jounin said. "You still have two trials to go. You aren't chuunin just yet."

We all inwardly groaned, then listened as the jounin continued. "The next part of the Exams will take place at the forest of Death. Be there by nine. Or else. Oh, and I suggest you clear out now before the sobbing, destructively angry, or plain old annoyed teams get here after being told that they failed." The jounin counted off the different states of emotion on his fingers. "See ya!" and he disappeared with the 'poof' associated with transportation jutsus.

We stood silently again as his word sunk in. When I heard two voices, which I identified as Kohaku and Kagami's whining even though they did pass, I turned and walked down the hallway with the intent to leave. I sensed Deki and Kazu following closely behind, but there was and unknown presence somewhere in front of me. I turned a corner, but bumped into him. The unknown who looked like the boy from the dream's evil twin. He did look evil.

"Hey," he said coldly, "watch it."

"I apologize," I said timidly. "I wasn't watching where I was going."

"Obviously," he replied with a look of disdain.

"Well, my name is Tomoko. Riku Tomoko."

"Akuma. Nekowa Akuma," he replied.

At that moment, I saw Kazu motion wildly from the end of the hallway for me to meet them immediately. "Umm, sorry again, Nekowa-san." I ran to the end of the hallway and sharply turned the corner, then saw Sasuke-brat's-older-brother. After running into him, that is. Literally.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down! Are you alright?" he asked concernedly and with a touch of amusement.

"Yeah…" I replied, rubbing my forehead. "I have _got_ to stop running into you!"

He simply chuckled. "Well, your friends are in that room over there, Room 62. I'd hurry if I were you."

"Thank you!" I said quickly, inclining my head slightly before taking off again. Right when I spotted the sign saying 'Room 62,' I ran towards the door it distinguished, just as Kazu stepped out, and—you guessed it—we collided. We both ended up on the floor, where Kazu was rubbing his head, and I was rubbing my forehead. Again.

"Oww… remind me to NEVER do that again…" Kazu snickered before yanking me up and pulling me into the room.

"So you finally made it," I heard Deki say. I turned around to see him slouched in a chair at a desk.

"Sorry. I got sidetracked." I grinned sheepishly.

"So I've seen."

"By the way, doesn't Akuma mean demon?" Deki shrugged. "I'll ask Yumi."

"Anyway, we should plan for tomorrow for the Forest of Death. Tomoko should have the supply list, I have the strategies needed depending on our purpose and terrain, and Kazu—you're in charge of gathering up bedding, tents, and that kind of stuff."

"Let me guess. I'm carrying the heavy stuff," I pouted disappointedly.

"Well, Kazu needs a light load in order to do taijutsu, you're stronger than me, and your techniques require the least amount of movement. Plus, you've got the best chakra control so you can conserve more energy than Kazu and I can," Deki answered with irrefutable logic.

"Fine." Deki and I gave each other and Kazu the lists.

"So, what are we doing for the rest of the day?" Kazu asked. "_I'm_ going out to explore!"

"Shogi match with Shikamaru," Deki answered shortly.

"With that little kid?"

He shrugged. "He's considered a genius. I want to test that statement."

"Well, I'm going to walk near the Forest of Death, nice name by the way, and I'll gather information about the area while I'm at it."

"Alright. Back to the inn by—?"

"Nine o'clock at the latest," I filled in for Deki.

"Got it. Bye!" Kazu jumped out the window and perched on the outside sill. "Come on!" Deki landed lightly on the ground three stories down.

"See ya!" I swung out the window onto the roof, then turned and ran swiftly in the direction of the large, ancient trees surrounding Konoha.

* * *

(1) Miki, if you didn't know.


	13. Ch 13: The Forest of Death

Ch. 13: The Forest of Death

* * *

Dawn broke. I yawned and stretched out, then jumped off of the branch I was sitting on.

_Hn… That was a good rest. I think I'll go back to the inn now._

I began running in the direction of the town. I arrived at the room to find Kazu running around, calling my name.

"Where the fuck were you?" I heard Deki demand from behind me. I suddenly remembered the night before.

_I was walking through the forest, becoming acquainted with the native plants when I sensed an unknown chakra signature. "Who's there?" I called out._

_Miki suddenly appeared in front of me, but this Miki had a deranged smile. "You," she snarled. _"You_ ruined my life." I looked at her in confusion. "_I_ should have been the heir. But no, you were discovered to be my elder, so they sent you off to a peasant family to keep you safe. I was also sent off. I was the new Mizukage's closest relative, and Kohei was my legal younger twin brother. You, on the other hand, were the illegitimate daughter of the old Mizukage who died. But you were conceived before me. I was forced to be born prematurely to become your elder, but you still were in existence in the womb before I. You were sent away until your time of leadership came. But no one even knew of you—you were not a legal child. So I was the one they came after, and my foster mother took up my image to protect me. So my twin and foster brother were sent to the somewhat safer village of Suna with me. But once you're out of the way, _I'm_ next in line. I'll make it happen." With a maniacal laugh, she sprung into the trees and raced away. I slept in the forest after that, pondering over what she said._

"Tomoko!" Deki's voice brought me back to the present. "Wait—you weren't sexually violated, were you?"

"You mean raped?" Washi said bluntly.

"What the fuck! Why would you ask her that?" Yumi exclaimed.

"What? NO! OF COURSE NOT!" I yelled.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes! What the fudge! I should know! I'm a frickin' ninja!"

"Okay! But you better have a good excuse, because you're making us late," Deki said in annoyance.

"Sorry."

"Bye!" Washi said as he, Yumi, and Kaida ran off. I rushed into my room and threw the few things I needed into three piles. I stored them all in three scrolls, then I packed up my ninja tool pouch, threaded my headband through the straps, secured it behind my back, then settled it on my waist. I strapped my pre-packed shuriken, kunai, notebook, and seed pouch onto my right thigh.

"Alright! Let's go." Kazu nodded and Deki immediately took off from the balcony. We followed him immediately, and after overtaking him, I led the way to the forest.

We barely made it in time, but an unseen woman named Anko gathered us all around a large fence. A slim, dark figure suddenly leapt from a tree, and I caught a glimpse of a spiky ponytail, a tan trench coat and a fishnet ninja-mail top. But as soon as she landed on the ground, she was hidden from view by a sea of taller people.

"All right, people!" a low husky, yet feminine voice bellowed. "If you've been here before, step back. Newbies to the front. NOW!"

"That's us." Kazu, Deki, and I pushed our way to the front, where we were practically touching this Anko lady, then found Yumi and the others, as well as some of my friends who were not from the Mist Village.

"All right, so the objective of this stage is… and most of you are aware that this is the only stage… ARE allowed to kill…" The buzz of quiet chattering drowned out the sound of her voice. "SHUT UP!" She launched a slew of kunai into the crowd, which immediately fell silent. She smiled wickedly, then continued as if she had just finished giving the instructions. "Now GO!" I immediately followed Deki from our 'front row seat', ignoring the strange looks the three of us received, while I couldn't help but smirk mischievously. No one else moved and Anko looked at us confusedly. As we made our way to the entrance that was the correct one, according to Deki, and I was handed a black scroll, Anko continued to bellow at the rest of the testers. After we went through the large entrance and we were in the safety of a tree, Deki filled us in.

"This forest is filled with deadly animals and will soon also contain deadly shinobi. To pass, we need both a heaven and an earth scroll, meaning a white and a black scroll. Then, we bring them to the tower in the center of the forest for the next stage. But, we cannot open the scrolls or some unspecified bad thing will happen to us. We have an earth scroll, so we need to get a heaven scroll."

I nodded and pulled out a chunky black scroll from the ninja tool pouch that was situated on Kazu's waistband in the back.

"Hey!" he protested.

"What?" I said annoyedly. "We need it, and obviously you weren't pulling it out. I'll disguise it as a fake one, put it in your pouch, then put the real one in my pouch!" _Don't let him say anything!_ I thought as 'loudly' as I could. Deki nodded and clamped his hand over Kazu's mouth before he could make any noise. I did a transformation jutsu and put the real scroll in Kazu's pouch, and the fake one in the pouch at the back of my own waist. "Come on, let's get moving before the others enter the forest. I think I already hear some of them."

We sprinted until we were deep in the forest. We began searching around for teams with heaven scrolls. We encountered one team of eighteen and nineteen-year-olds, but they had obviously overheard our 'conversation' from earlier. One of the two boys in the group appeared behind me. He spoke in what was supposed to be a seductive tone, so I played along.

"Hey, babe, do you have an earth scroll?"

"I might," I purred back, rubbing my shoulders against his chest. "Why don't you check for me?" I asked with an innocent expression and an oh-so-innocent voice. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the guy's male teammate fall over with a nosebleed. _Disgusting…_

"Okay," the boy said slowly as he reached for the pouch where the scroll was. He pulled it out with one swift motion and threw it into the air, yelling, "HA! Idiot! Can't believe you fell for it!"

The missing female team member swung out of a tree and grabbed the scroll in midair. "What is this?" she cried, slicing it in half with a kunai, dispelling the transformation jutsu with a 'poof'. As the scroll halves fell to the ground, I sank to my knees, sobbing.

"NOOOO! That was our real one disguised as a fake one! Now we're gonna die out here!" My voice cracked as I continued to wail. "I don't want to die! Why did you do that! Waahhhhh!" I collapsed into an emotional wreck.

"Now I feel bad," the guy who had 'tricked' me said. Then I heard the girl gasp sharply, followed by the light thud of three bodies falling to the ground. I stood up jerkily, shakily wiping away imaginary tears. I sniffled a few times.

"Idiot. Can't believe you fell for it," I said with contempt to the male body closest to me.

"Nice acting," Deki said, "but they don't even have a scroll at all."

"Thanks. That's just too bad," I answered. Then I grimaced as we stumbled upon a gruesome scene. Hitoshi and the Twin Terrors were both dead and strewn all over a small clearing. Literally. Stepping over Kagami's severed lower leg, I stuck my tongue out in disgust. "Well, let's hope we don't stumble upon whoever or whatever did this. Though I would have to thank them," I joked as we quickly left, the smell of blood following.

We continued to search until I heard a familiar voice. Three, actually.

"Come on Kaida, do I HAVE TO?" it whined. "Yumi, back me up!"

"Nope. Sorrrrry!" Yumi sang from the same grove of trees. I put my index finger to my lips in the classic 'shut up' sign, then half-spoke, half-sang in a low, bumbling voice.

"Hum-dee-dum-dee-dum. We have a white scroll, what does it mean? Hum-dee-dum-dee-dee!" I nicknamed this voice the 'idiot' voice. Then I used a thin, wheedling, nasally male voice.

"Shaddup! We can't let anyone know where we are!"

"You both are idiots. Now let me do my work," I said in a low, melodic, feminine voice.

"Oh, okay." I used the idiot voice. "Hum-dee-doo, we DON'T have a white scroll. La-di-da-di-da. Oh, hello Miss Spider. Do you have a black scroll?"

Cue the wheedler. "Not that we need one!"

"You _do_ realize that you just talked to a spider?"

I motioned for my two real teammates to hide while using the melodic, syrupy voice. I heard snickering from the two girls before I jumped up into a tree and masked my chakra.

A high, timid voice spoke up. "I have a black scroll. Would you like to give me yours?" I stared in shock as Washi stepped out into the clearing. Except _this_ Washi had long, down his back, wavy hair, a thin willowy body, feminine features, and a short dress. All in all, he, or should I say, SHE, was a very small figure, one that guys would call 'cute'.

"Henge," Deki muttered from next to me.

"Fuck," Washi swore. "There's no one here." With a white 'poof', he dispelled the transformation jutsu and returned to his normal form. "Yumi, I am going to fucking kill you for making me do that."

"Okay!" Yumi called as Washi went back to what was obviously their campsite. "Right after Tomoko lets Miki date Kazu!"

"That's never gonna happen," Kaida commented.

"Exactly my point."

I quickly led Kazu and Deki through the trees until we were a safe distance away, yet still relatively close to Yumi, Kaida, and Washi's camp. "Shit. They have a black scroll," Kazu stated.

"I know. Well, let's turn in now. If we want to get an early start, we need to sleep early too."

I released the sleeping mats and food supplies from the storage scroll they were in with a bit of chakra in place of the customary drop of blood. "I took the liberty of making a few soldier pills from the plants while in the forest. These will give energy, replenish chakra, and help heal wounds. Oh, and I have some all-purpose antidote pills too, for just in case. Oh, and Deki, remember, we are allowed to kill, but that doesn't mean we should go on killing sprees."

"However will I live?" he commented sarcastically.

"Alright, everyone gets a soldier pill, then we rest. Okay? Let's set up traps so no one can sneak in."

"Okay! I KNEW I packed the wire for a reason!" Kazu exclaimed, immediately beginning to string some up. We set up the ninja wires so that they would be connected to either palm, for Kazu and Deki, and one on each of my fingers, seeing as how I had a uniquely sensitive chakra control. That way, we would know if anything disturbed the wires. I grew brambles for those who made it past the wires. The final defense was a dome, constructed from thick, woven tree roots. We connected the wires, lay down on our sleeping mats, and fell asleep quickly.

I woke to the sound of Yumi speaking dangerously close by. I sighed in relief when I remembered that the dome had a camouflage jutsu, specialty of the Mist Village, cast over it.

"I hate to say it, but I've tried everything! You're my last resort!" That was Yumi's voice.

"Are you friggin' serious? That's the third time this fucking week!" Washi's voice said.

"I know. It's not like I like this anymore than you do. Wait… if what Tomoko said is true, then you must REALLY like th—"

"Just shut the hell up so I can do it and we can get over with it," Washi interrupted.

"Fine!"

I knew what happened next. It was impossible for me not to—Yumi and I exchanged secrets all the time. I tried not to giggle when Washi finally said, "All right, let's get back," signaling that they were finished. I looked behind me to find Kazu looking bewildered. I had to try even harder not to laugh.

I tensed as a chakra presence disturbed the chakra network set up around the dome, then relaxed when I recognized it as Deki's chakra signature. I made an opening in the dome, and sank the whole thing back into the ground, admitting Deki into our view. A pissed off Deki, that is.

"That bastard Warami," he muttered darkly.

"Hey, Deki, I need to tell you—" I wasn't able to finish before Deki walked up to a tree, about three feet in diameter, and punched it. The trunk splintered like a toothpick before the fury-powered blow. I backed up, keeping an eye on my unstable teammate. I nudged Kazu with my elbow. He didn't respond, so I quickly looked back to see him looking at Deki, who was obliterating more trees with chakra-enforced attacks, with anxiety in his eyes. His right hand was clenched around a kunai so hard that his knuckles were white.

"Damn," he swore, "I forgot his meds."

"Oh fuck." It was so bad of a predicament that I didn't even try to cover up the swear I had just uttered that completely went against my no-swearing-ever-I-have-never-cursed-before-except-for-once-which-was-an-accident-(thanks-a-lot-Deki) policy. The reason why? It was simple. Without his pills in the morning, Deki turned into a psychopathic, unstable, homicidal killer. Yeah, ouch.

My thoughts were disturbed by a rustling in the bushes. I jumped into a defensive stance with Kazu covering my back. Deki was still storming around being destructive. I pulled out a kunai, just as I heard a voice speaking.

"Oh, so Washi finally got a girlfriend? Oh, and Hideki's jealous. Hey, Tomoko actually swore, and I don't think Kazuyuki has gotten over his stupid, pointless crush on my sister." The owner of the voice emerged from a clump of shrubs to my right and Kazu's left, followed by his two teammates.

"Tokomi Naoya," Deki gritted out with pure hatred.

"In the flesh. Don't you feel lucky that I'm actually talking to you?" Naoya responded. He was flanked by Nekowa Akuma, and his foster-sister Miki, who still wore a deranged smile. "Oh, and thanks for taking out that team. Their white scroll was unnecessary for us, but we took it anyway. After all, we couldn't let someone like you get a hold of it, could we?" Naoya said, backed up by another maniacal laugh from Miki.

"Oh, I finally get to kill you. Goody, I've been waiting to see your blood pouring out while you scream in delicious agony!" She shrieked at me in laughter again to emphasize her point.

"And I get a part in the deal too." I stared at Nekowa-san, who was now obviously just Akuma, as he spoke up. I heard a splintering sound and shuddered at how dangerously close Deki had gotten, a wild look in his eyes as he demolished the trunk of another tree.

Deki snickered evilly before saying, "I've waited for years to do this." With a sickening crunch, he sank his fist into Naoya's unguarded face with a chakra-strengthened attack. Naoya dropped to the ground with a bloody, mangled mess for a face, and Deki also fell back, unconscious from chakra depletion.

"As I was saying," Akuma continued as if nothing had happened, "you, Riku Tomoko, have a trait that only comes about once at a time in the whole world. There is also one being at a time who can get rid of this trait. That person? Me. The trait? Your genjutsu.

"From your expression, I can see that you came in contact with my idiot twin brother. If you haven't guessed yet, then I'll save you the trouble of straining your brain. He was the former keeper of this special skill. Of course, once I got him out of the way, it moved to you."

"You mean you killed your own brother?" I asked in shock.

"No, not at all. I just used the technique I'm about to use on you. I call it the Mangekyou Sharingan."

"Say wha—" I had no time to finish before he began making rapid handsigns.

"Of course, this isn't the original version, but it works, and I liked the name. Now, instead of pointing or locking eyes, I send out a pulse. And thanks to Miki, you are now frozen in place."

It was true. I couldn't move, and I now knew that one, this pulse would take away my genjutsu, and two, from what I learned from Deki, I was about to be put though the worst, most fatal torture genjutsu ever in existence. I was doomed. I closed my eyes and accepted my fate. That is, until I felt my intangible constraints disappear. I opened my eyes to see Miki on the ground, blood soaking into the thirsty dirt from where a kunai stuck out of her neck. I looked to my right to see Kazu with a now empty hand and in a stance that indicated that he had launched the fatal projectile. But Akuma was still gathering energy for the pulse. I pulled out a kunai at the same time as Kazu, and threw it towards Akuma with deadly accuracy, but Akuma smiled as the kunai bounced off an unseen shield.

"Too late."

A black ball formed in front of Akuma's outstretched hands, a sphere of pure darkness.

"Have a tortured sleep."

I was rooted to the spot, watching as if in a frame-by-frame movie. Kazu screamed "NOOO!" and jumped in front of me while flinging his withheld kunai. It struck Akuma in the stomach, and he fell to the ground just as the sphere left his hands. It traveled in a heartbeat, and hit flesh, sinking into it and drawing a cry in agony from the victim. Kazu.

Time returned to its regular speed. I jerked forward and caught Kazu before he hit the ground. His eyes spasmed behind his closed eyelids, and a single pained word fell from his lips before he fell unconscious.

"Tomoko…"

As the shock sank in and I sank to my knees with Kazu still in my arms, five things hit me with shocks like thunderbolts.

Both of my teammates were knocked out.

We were in the middle of a forest filled with man-eating creatures and deadly shinobi.

As soon as he woke up, I would have a dangerous, homicidal teenager on my hands.

My teammate and best friend took the most fatal torture jutsu in existence in place of me, and probably had fallen in love with me, and

I felt the same way towards him.

In other words—I just fell for my best friend.

* * *

A/N: Oooh drama!


	14. Ch 14: Sarutobi san

Ch. 14: Sarutobi-san

* * *

I looked up and found that Akuma's chest was still slowly rising up and down. He was alive still, but in extreme pain from the wound caused by the projectile protruding from his stomach. I lay Kazu gently on the ground by Deki, then restrained both he and Deki's limbs and torso, Kazu's with soft grass so he wouldn't hurt himself by thrashing around, and Deki's with strong vines for when he regained consciousness. I walked up to Akuma, debating whether or not to take him out of his misery or to leave him there in agony. I surveyed his body, looking for the telltale signs of imminent death. None were present. Starting from his feet, I made one more visual sweep to check over his body. Reaching his face, I made the mistake of looking at his eyes. They were open, red and black, and they locked my own eyes within their stare.

"Trait transfer. Mangekyou Sharingan!"

Instantaneously, a searing pain burned behind my eyes. I tried to pull away, but his blood red and malefic black eyes held me within their grasp. I struggled as I felt blood dripping down my face. Then as suddenly as it started, it ended.

"Transfer complete."

The intense pain softened to a dull ache, and Akuma's sharp eyes faded to a dim black. He drew one last shuddering breath, then closed his eyes for the last time. While I looked on, his body began disintegrating, and the kunai started to change shape. A blinding flash of intense light forced me to look away, but when I turned my attention back, a flat metal disk lay where Akuma's body had been. It was about the size of my palm, and when I bent over to pick it up, a flash of sunlight revealed an obsidian black and dusky red design on its surface. As soon as I lifted it off of the ground, I felt my senses grow sharper, particularly my sight.

"The sycamore found the willow wrapped around the gingko in the shade." Caught by surprise, I slipped the disk into my thigh pouch, then reflexively, I jumped into a defensive stance over Kazu and Deki, then relaxed when I realized what I had just heard.

"Yumi, you can come out now."

"Told ya it would work." Kaida's voice preceded her.

"Damn. I'll pay you when we get out of here," Washi spoke as the three of them stepped into the clearing. As soon as Yumi saw Kazu and Deki, she gasped.

"What the fuck happened?" she exclaimed.

"Naoya and Miki," I said shortly, motioning toward their bodies. She looked over and grimaced. "Do you have the capsules?" I said, subtly indicating Deki, who was slowly gaining consciousness. Yumi nodded and tossed the slim pill to me.

"Always carry 'em, just in case!"

I took out the same herbs I had happened to grab the night I spent in the forest after the confrontation with Miki. I strengthened his bonds with some thick roots. _Thank god this is a sedative._ I squeezed the juices of the plant into Deki's mouth just as he woke up. "Eat this," I said forcefully, before he could do anything. I dropped it past his lips and he swallowed. A minute or two elapsed before the medicine took effect. I released him from the woody restraints, and he slowly propped himself up with both elbows.

"What the hell happened?" he rasped. I handed him a canteen of water. He took a swig before I debriefed him on what had happened after he fell unconscious, ending with where Kazu got hit by the Mangekyou Sharingan.

"Hey, they had two white scrolls!" Washi voiced his discovery.

"And they're both real," Deki added. Washi tossed a scroll to me and the other to Kaida.

"Let's go." Deki took the scroll and put it in his pouch, then popped a soldier pill in his mouth before picking up the large scroll containing our supplies so that my hands would be free. Instead, I picked up Kazu and Yumi helped prop him up, piggyback style, onto my back. She tied his wrists together, securing his arms around my neck so he wouldn't fall. We took off into the forest. Yumi, Washi, and Kaida guarded us while Deki navigated and I carried the most important load with only one thing in mind—finishing up the challenge so we could get Kazu to medical attention ASAP. We finally found ourselves in front of a large, looming tower.

Our two teams separated there, with Yumi and crew going to their designated entrance, er, exit from the forest, and Deki and I finding our own. Deki walked in before me. Deki pondered over a message, a riddle, on the opposite wall.

"We have to open both scrolls at the same time," he told me. He took out the white scroll, and removed the black scroll from Kazu's ninja tool pouch, and we unfurled them at the same time. Immediately, there was a white 'poof' and a jounin appeared in front of us.

"Enter through the do—"

"My teammate needs specialized medical attention," I interrupted him.

The jounin took a look at Kazu before saying, "I'll bring a med-nin."

"No." I stopped him. "We're going with you, and you are taking us to the Hokage's best medical team, unless you want the Mizukage on your tail." I stopped before adding more politely, "It is of utmost importance." I looked at Deki, and he nodded.

"Very well," the jounin complied. "But be careful—Hokage-sama is a busy man. You better not be wasting his time," he warned. He made a few rapid hand signs and I felt the peculiar sensation of floating before we appeared in an office in front of an old, wrinkly man leafing through papers on his desk.

"Hokage-sama!" I heard the jounin say. The man looked up with a fierce gaze.

"_Please_ leave. This is confidential," Deki grated out, addressing the jounin.

"What do you kids want?" the Hokage asked gruffly after the jounin exited.

One phrase was all it took. "Mangekyou Sharingan."

"Sharingan…?" His eyes widened, and he immediately ushered us into a hospital room connected to his office.

"K-S 052!" He yelled. An ANBU and a med-nin immediately appeared at the doorway with a case of medicinal substances. I guessed he was who the Hokage had called for. I quickly undid the bindings around Kazu's wrists, then deposited him on the hospital bed.

"Please exit the room," the ANBU said firmly, more as a command than a suggestion. I saw the med-nin begin to remove Kazu's shirt.

"No. I'm his teammate and best friend. I'm not leaving," I said defiantly.

"Let them both stay," the Hokage commanded, walking back into his office. "Dove, Ayuka-san—you know what is required."

Another ANBU suddenly burst into the room as the med-nin, Ayuka, started back up with Kazu's shirt removal. "You summoned me, Hokage-sama?"

"Yes, Ferret. This child is claiming that her teammate was attacked with the Sharingan."

The ANBU nodded sharply. "What did he look like?" he asked flatly.

"Black hair, my height, black clothing, straight hair, black eyes, pale skin. Said his name was…" Deki trailed off. The med-nin had finally succeeded in ridding Kazu of his top without ripping it.

"Nekowa. Akuma Nekowa," I filled in.

"Sir, he's not responding to anything!" the med-nin called out desperately. I suddenly remembered. I pulled out the flat metal disk.

"Try using this."

"The Sharingan Disk." The Hokage said, surprised, before delicately taking it from me. He lay it on Kazu's bare chest, then had the med-nin apply her healing chakra. The usual greenish glow surrounding her fingertips slowly changed to a peculiar burnt orange. Kazu's breathing slowed to a normal, steady pace and his eyes stopped flickering behind his eyelids. The Hokage picked up the disk and pocketed it.

"He's simply in a trance," the med-nin concluded. I remembered another thing—the last discovery I made back before leaving the Mist Village.

"Do you have any of this plant?" I inquired, puling out my notebook and pointing at the drawn picture and description. Ayuka recognized it.

"We have a large abundance of that herb, but have no uses other than as a flavoring for food dishes," she informed me.

"Well, now you have a use. Please bring some!"

The first ANBU, Dove, nodded and disappeared through the door. The Hokage was flipping through my notebook. "Amazing," he commented, "such a treasure trove of information! Where did you learn these things from?" he asked me as he handed it back.

"Experience and testing," I replied. "I control plants. For real, and for genjutsu. Well, I don't know if my genjutsu will work anymore…"

Just then, the ANBU burst back through the door with a handful of the green foliage, which she gave to me. Deki aided me in soaking them, then I ground them up and steeped the mashed remains. I poured some of the liquid into Kazu's mouth and he immediately awoke, coughing.

"…Tomoko…" he croaked. "Deki…"

"We're fine," Deki responded.

"Will you two come with me?" the Hokage asked.

"If it's information on Akuma you want, I'll go, but Deki knows nothing other than what he said before. Let him stay with Kazu," I suggested.

"Very well. Ayuka-san, you know what to do. Ferret, come with me." He escorted me back into his office. "Now, describe this man as well as you can."

"I don't mean to brag or anything, sir, but although I am quite articulate with words, I can do better than that. I can actually draw a picture."

"I see. Ferret!" The ANBU nodded and produced a sheet of paper and a case of colored pencils.

"Thank you." I bowed slightly as he handed them to me. I pulled out a tiny scroll from the pouch at my waist, and wiped some blood off of my face. I used it to summon a small writing surface. I set it in my lap, lay the paper on top, and began to draw. I added every little detail I could remember, from the way the light glinted in his eyes to the small scar on his hand that shined white right before he released the sphere of darkness that… well, you know. I included a close-up on his eye, the right one, for how it looked right before he said the trait transfer thing. While I worked, the Hokage attempted to make small talk.

"Well, first of all, what is your name again?" he asked.

"Riku. Riku Tomoko," I answered.

"I see. Well, you may call me Sarutobi if you like. In fact, please call me by that."

I nodded without looking up from my drawing. I finished, the process taking about five minutes in total, and I caught the ANBU with poorly concealed shock apparent through his chakra face before he quickly repressed the feeling.

"Done," I said, handing the finished drawing to the Hoka—er, Sarutobi-san.

He picked it up and studied it before saying, "Well, he certainly looks like he could be related." The ANBU nodded in agreement. "Now, tell me about all the incidents or run-ins you've had with this Akuma." I recalled every event, but I left out the trait transfer part, simply ending with, 'he stopped breathing and his chakra signature faded away.' Sarutobi-san asked, "Is that it?" I nodded in response. "Very well. You may leave."

I nodded again and turned, then thought better of it and spun back around. "If I tell you what really happened, will you answer a few questions?"

"About our village?" Sarutobi-san asked guardedly.

"No, about _our_ village."

"Depends. But for now, yes." I accepted it as the best I could get. "I'm guessing it has something to do with the blood on your face?" I reached up and felt the thick, sticky, drying substance.

"Oh, um, yeah, can I, you know," I pantomimed rubbing my face.

"Of course. Ferret." The ANBU retrieved a damp cloth from the other room and handed it to me.

"Thank you." I wiped my face, then started talking. "After I tried to decide whether or not to take him out of his misery or leave him there, I noticed that none of the signs of eminent death were present. I looked at his face to look for the sallow coloring, but I looked at his eyes and they were still black and red patterned. Then he said, 'Trait Transfer. Mangekyou Sharingan!' All of a sudden, I felt this searing pain behind my eyes, then he said 'Trait Transfer complete.' Then he stopped breathing. His body disintegrated in this bright light, and when I looked back, the kunai in his stomach was that disk. The Sharingan Disk, I think that's what you said."

"I see." Sarutobi-san took out the aforementioned disk and handed it to me. I instantaneously felt my sight sharpen. "You will probably want to keep this. Now, what were the questions you wanted to ask?"

"Do I have the Mangekyou Sharingan, or just the Sharingan, or nothing at all? And what is so special about my normal genjutsu?"

Sarutobi-san sighed. "To know that, you have to go into the history of the Leaf Village. But to make things simpler, the Sharingan is the bloodline trait of the Uchiha clan." His voice became heavy with sorrow. "This kekkei-genkai is the most powerful, lethal, destructive genjutsu ever discovered, and one of the last Uchichas advanced it to such a level that he could not only affect things mentally, but physically.

"But, there have been legends of a genjutsu even more powerful than the Sharingan. One person has it at a time. It is not by bloodline. It simply moves from person to person at the last owner's death. Its path is very erratic. If a baby with it dies within its first week, it may pass to a grandfather located halfway around the world, for it is very unstable. Once every few centuries, a person comes along who has it from birth, unlocks it at a very young age, and can keep it stably within their bodies.

"With each of these carriers comes another with the ability to force the said trait to another without killing the keeper, but even though it is possible to leave the affected alive, this genjutsu is often fatal. Conversely, it is fortunate that this genjutsu can only be used in the presence of the first, so it is powerless unless near the partner carrier. This technique must also be physically passed on to another. If not passed on, it dies with its keeper, until either a century passes, or the keeper is resurrected, according to the legend.

"It is unthinkable for one person to house both traits, according to their characteristics. They are polar opposites. One is as cold and composed as ice, the other as hot, passionate, and volatile as a raging wildfire. It would probably tear the person apart from end to end. But, obviously, since the genjutsu worked on your teammate, either he, your teammate, or you are a carrier. Or, it could be that your teammate, Joseph Nisi, _had_ it. But that seems highly unlikely, seeing that Akuma was going after you, and neither of your teammates have any type of genjutsu. So I'm thinking that the possessor of this genjutsu would be you."

I sat silently for a second, struggling to soak in all of the information that had just been dumped on my head. "One more question." I cleared my throat. "An old acquaintance from our village that moved to Suna said that I am the daughter of the late Mizukage, and that she is, er, was, the daughter of the current one. She said I was illegitimate, but because I was conceived first, although she was forced into being born prematurely, before my own natural birth, I 'stole' the inheritance line from her. Is that true?"

"I'm not an expert on your village, but… this is classified information, so it does not leave this room, understand?" I nodded. "Well, the late Mizukage was a jinchūriki. He, Yagura, was the container for the Three Tailed Giant Turtle Demon. The chakra of jinchūriki tends to be very unique, as do their fighting styles. You have encountered Naruto, correct?" I nodded again. "Remember, this does not leave the room. Well, he is also a jinchūriki, for the Nine-Tails, the Giant Fox Demon. Because of this, he has a secondary chakra supply, the chakra of the Demon Fox."

"So why is this important?"

"I know that traits do not pass hereditarily from jinchūriki to their offspring, but if you find your fighting style to be much different from others', please keep me informed."

I nodded. "Thank you for the information, Sarutobi-san. I have one last question. Will Kazu be coming with Deki and I back to the Exams?"

"…No," he answered after a slight hesitation. "We will need to study his chakra, mental, and physical systems before we can send him over. The Sharingan can be fatal, so we need to see how badly it has affected him. But I'll make sure that his match doesn't get called until he's ready. I'll send you and your other teammate along to the arena. Ferret can escort you." I nodded in assent.

"Wait, you said 'one of the last Uchihas', correct?"

He nodded.

"What do you mean, 'last' Uchihas?"

"You also met Sasuke, yes?"

"Yeah."

"His older brother, Itachi, massacred the rest of the clan. This does not leave the room."

"I understand. Wait, he massacred his own family members!" I exclaimed in shock.

"Yes, it was a grievous occurrence."

"Oh. Sasuke's older brother?"

"Yes."

"Oh." _Wait. Sasuke's… older… brother…?_

"_You really look like this kid named Uchiha Sasuke."_

"_He is my younger brother."_

"Does he have long black hair in a ponytail and lines going from the corners of his eyes downwards?"

"Yes! Why do you ask?"

"I SAW HIM IN THE VILLAGE."

"WHAT?" Sarutobi-san shouted. "WHERE?"

"Once in the street, I bumped into him, and then in the hallway of the building of the first Exam!"

"HAWK!" An ANBU poofed in.

"Yes sir?"

"Take your team and scour the village for Uchiha Itachi. Immediately!"

The ANBU nodded and poofed out.

"…How did we not notice?" Sarutobi-san muttered to himself.

"Umm, sir, I believe he may have been in a henge or a genjutsu that kept other people from recognizing him."

"What makes you think that?" he asked sharply.

"Well, when I first saw him, he looked like I described, but one of the first things I noticed was that he had these really nice gray eyes."

"Gray… eyes?" Sarutobi-san repeated, confused.

"Yeah. Then I heard one of the girls talking about his 'gorgeous green eyes', and when I told him that he looked like Sasuke, he said 'Interesting' before telling me he was Sasuke's older brother. I think I might have seen through it or something."

"I see. Well, let's hope that you're wrong and that Itachi isn't here in the village. Now, you should get going now if you want to make it to the Exams on time."

"Right! Thank you again," I said before pivoting and walking to the door. Ayuka slipped out, informing Sarutobi-san that Kazu was ready for inspection. I walked through the door, and stopped, turned, and shielded my eyes with my arm as my body reacted. "ACK!" I waited for my brain to catch up and register what I had just done.

"Don't blame him," Deki said, breaking the temporary wall between my mental and physical systems. "You were the one who walked in without knocking. And you saw him like this just a few minutes earlier, every time we went swimming, and every time you've healed him!" Deki reminded me.

"Hehe… right… sorry, impulse reaction. Anyway, Deki, come on. _We're_ going, and Kazu," I turned to look at Kazu, who, thankfully, had put back on the shirt that was missing before, "is going to catch up with us later."

They both nodded. "See ya!" Kazu called after us as we walked out the door, surprisingly cheerful seeing that he had just gone through one of the worst tortures ever experienced in human kind. I turned to wave.

"Bye!"

We followed the ANBU out of the office, where he told us what he was going to do. "I'll drop you guys off at the entrance of the arena, using a teleportation jutsu, but I need to come straight back here afterwards. Just walk right through the entrance." Deki and I nodded simultaneously.

The ANBU made the necessary handsigns, and with the customary 'poof', we appeared inside the tower in the forest, in front of an entrance with double doors. "Good luck!" he said tonelessly, then he left before we could respond.

"Well, let's go in!" I said. I pushed open one of the two doors, and we walked in. Out of the left corner of my eye, I saw a hand waving. I turned and discovered it belonged to Yumi, who was beckoning wildly. I grabbed Deki's elbow. "Come on!" I pulled him to the area where her team seemed to be gathered. "So?" I asked.

"The next stage is a series of one-on-one battles that will take place down there," she pointed through the railing that blocked off the second floor inside balcony that ran around the room. "They're announcing the first match right now." She pointed at a large billboard, and two panels spun around until they stopped at…

Sou Kaida vs. Hyūga Chinatsu.


	15. Ch 15: Accuracy

Ch. 15: Accuracy

* * *

Kaida jumped over the railing and landed lightly on the ground below, almost squatting with her hands on the ground on either side of her legs, which were balanced on the balls of her feet. She stood up as Chinatsu dropped to the ground on the opposite side of the arena. The proctor started the match, saying, "Sou Kaida versus Hyūga Chinatsu." He backed up so he wasn't between the two opponents, all the while holding a senbon needle between his teeth. "Let the match begin!"

Neither of the girls moved a muscle, other than the ones in their eyes, studying the other. I, for one, knew that this was Kaida's way of having fun in our village, where she knew she would easily beat her opponent. She would study their body structure, the build of the muscles and such, and from that, would try to guess their fighting style. She'd play with them for a bit in the way that a cat would play with a mouse before eating it, just long enough to see all of their tricks, then she would end the match and evaluate her conjecture. She would usually test her newest skills on them, 'living training dummies,' as she called them.

The whole arena and all of its occupants, mainly consisting of the genin teams and their senseis, all on the second, balcony-like viewing floor, was silent. Hyūga Chinatsu broke the silence. "I see that you are a Sou. One of your kind was executed here about a week ago. It was great fun to watch the insect die."

"Chinatsu!" One of the genins on the other side of the arena spoke, half in disbelief, half reproachfully. I took her to be Chinatsu's teammate.

"I wonder if you'll squirm as delightfully as the other one did when on the brink of death," Chinatsu said, unperturbed.

"Oh yeah, and you're not allowed to kill here," Yumi whispered into my ear.

"Ah, that's why the 'brink' was in there."

"That's what I'm guessing."

I shoved my hand into my weapons pouch and felt around for the slim disk. I found it, then the action started.

Kaida was the one who made the first move. She took out a small scroll, whipped it open as fast as a whip cracks, inserted a small flow of chakra, and released a samurai sword with a wickedly curved blade, and in the same fluid motion, launched the weapon at Chinatsu, the whole process happening in the blink of an eye. Chinatsu, in turn, activated her Byakugan and knocked the blade off course with a hit to its handle. The blade flew towards and imbedded itself deeply in the wall. I didn't recognize the sword, so I guessed she got it from her friend, the weapons-mistress, Ten-Ten. Kaida swore in frustration. Chinatsu turned on her.

"How dare you use such vulgar language around me, you bitch!"

"Hey, you're not so pleasant yourself, although I wouldn't call _you_ a bitch. You're not feminine enough. You'd be more like a… warthog, maybe," Kaida answered, calm as ever.

While they continued to trade insults, Yumi told Deki and I about the specifics of this stage.

"This is the elimination round. After that, the people who are left draw a number, which is the number of the battle you are in. Oh, and I think Kaida's going to try out her newest weapon. I think it will be very effective against Chinatsu," she predicted.

I looked to the center, and sure enough, while the insults went flying back and forth, Kaida's hand was slowly creeping towards her weapon pouch. I saw a glint of light shine off of a length of ninja wire and a sharp metal point.

It happened quickly. Kaida launched about five shuriken towards Chinatsu, two of which had ninja wire attached to the inner ring section of each point. Chinatsu, with her Byakugan still activated, easily swatted away the first three. She went for the fourth and fifth, but to her surprise, they split into four sections, so there now were eight interlocking projectiles with four out of five sharp sides each, and all were connected to Kaida's fingers with chakra-proof ninja wires.

They flew around Chinatsu, wrapping around and around her, binding her tightly. Chinatsu managed to grab onto a handful of the wires and sent a powerful wave of chakra through them. Kaida disconnected all but two of the wires. Consequently, the chakra went through her body and made her system go haywire. Now free, Chinatsu walked up to Kaida. It seemed like the end of the match was here, and Chinatsu had gained the upper hand. Kaida sank to her knees, struggling to keep control over her spasming body, then—

Within a split second, Kaida whipped out her katana and ran it through Chinatsu's stomach and out the back, just as Chinatsu jabbed Kaida's last chakra point, paralyzing her.

Kaida stayed there, stuck on her knees with her hand clenched around the blade, and Chinatsu bent forward, coughing up blood, still impaled on the stationary katana. The proctor ended the match. A tie.

The med-nins came bustling out and carefully pulled Chinatsu off of the skewering katana and placed her on a stretcher and carried her away, while some others removed the sword from Kaida's hand and carried both it and her to the infirmary.

I myself froze stiff as soon as I realized something. I rushed over to Yumi.

"What if Deki and Washi face each other? Deki still is furious, and thinks that you and Washi you know…"

"Shit," she swore. She started to talk, but was interrupted by the spinning panels choosing the duelers for the next match. It landed on…

Riku Tomoko vs. Roshimi Riki.

"Well, we get a little more time," I commented. On the other side of the arena, a scrawny kid toppled ungracefully to the ground and landed on his face. He immediately got up and started brushing off his dark beige sweater, muttering curses while at it. I took my hand out of the pouch, then hopped onto the railing, about to descend much more delicately then this Riki character.

"Hey!" Surprised, I unbalanced and fell off. My foot caught onto the railing and turned me upside down, and I continued hurtling towards the ground. I turned the fall to a somersault in midair, then I landed lightly, right hand and left leg on the ground on either side of my bent left leg, and my right leg stretched out behind, my knee almost touching the ground. I stood up, looking up at the newcomer and grinning widely despite my annoyance. Then, I stepped to the middle, observing my opponent. The headband around his neck showed that he was a shinobi from the Land of Snow. I heard it was freezing there, all the time, which was exactly why I couldn't understand that this shrimpy guy was wearing a sweater in the warmth of Konoha.

The proctor called the start, and my opponent moved immediately, showering me with a barrage of kicks and punches. The attacks themselves were pretty weak, and the hardest might have left a small bruise, but the skinny guy was _fast_. He was pretty much a blur unless I reached in my weapons pouch and touched the Sharingan Disk. Then, it was simple to track his movements. I stood there, taking the hits, waiting for him to get tired so I could actually land a hit on him. After all—the Sharingan Disk only affected my eyesight, not my physical speed. The only other problem—about five minutes passed and the flurry of hits wasn't letting up at all. I finally got fed up.

"Too scared to stand and fight?"

"Too heavy to move?" he answered.

"Hey, watch it! I'll have you know that I'm pretty quick on my feet, but I'm not a buzzing, annoying pest like you!"

"Let me tell the story of your life. One day, you wanted to become a ninja. So you did. But then you met a guy named Riki." His voice came from all over, and his soft attacks were starting to hurt from hitting my skin in the same places over and over again. "They had a battle."

"Then Tomoko, the shinobi, defeated Riki, who became a depressed old geezer," I filled in.

"Oh my god, who's telling the story? I am! Now shut up!"

"Why don't you?"

"Oh, my, god! Do you know what shut up means?"

I finally had enough. This guy just kept pushing my buttons. And not just the mental ones. I swiftly grabbed a handful of seeds from the outmost pocket of the pouch on my right thigh, threw them on the ground by my feet, rapidly made the necessary handsigns, then pushed my chakra into the seeds, my own breed of roses with vines, willing them to grow up and up, higher and higher. I slowly rose up off the ground, lifted by three large, glossy, dark green leaves, which quickly grew a spiny, hair-like coat all over themselves, except not in the places I touched.

But, with a foot on one leaf and the other between the other two, my balance was compromised. I tipped forward and had to use a thick stem as a spotter to regain my balance. The thorns retracted as soon as I came within a millimeter of them. Good thing too—these thorns and the spines all over the three main roses carried a toxin that paralyzed a person. The attacks stopped once I got about ten feet off of the ground, and the blur condensed into one short, skinny guy in a beige sweater.

"Roses? How much more girly can you get?" he exclaimed.

"Watch it," I answered with an ominous tone before pulsing the spines to extend a foot more in the area he was standing closest to. He barely dodged them.

"Wow, someone's got a temper!"

"Bad move." I kept an eye on his position and began to prepare my genjutsu. I hopped down twelve feet and landed lightly on the ground. I slowly walked towards him, only for 'Riki' to disappear in a 'poof' and the attacks to restart. "Frick!" I muttered under my breath. I jumped back up to my three-leaf platform, level with the second viewing floor.

I sat down on the leaves, criss-cross-applesauce, and concentrated. I shut my eyes, and turned off all of my senses except for my sense of touch. I transferred most of my chakra network to the plant, so instead of an arm waving, a spiny vine would shake instead. I focused and felt wind blowing strongly and moving the thin 'hairs' on the surface of the vines, behind the spiky thorns. I followed the wind's trail around and around. Then, in one fluid movement, I retracted every last spine from one of the vines, then captured my opponent, wrapping him up tightly.

Parting with the plant and merging my chakra back with my body, I kept the plant's tight grip until I was down in front of him. I lowered him so his feet touched the ground. He attempted to slip out of the sweater to escape the rope-like wrappings, but only succeeded in showing off his red shirt and baring his arms. I understood the reason for the sweater. They were stick-like arms, arms covered in white scars. And not just thin, small, paper-cut-like scars. Thick, long jagged scars, running all the way down, spiraling around, zigzagging back and forth, ripping through his darkly tanned skin.

He looked me straight in the eye, and said quietly but fiercely, "You'll never understand what it's like to be me."

"Then hopefully, this will be a sweet, dreamless rest," I whispered for he and he only to hear. I activated my genjutsu and prepared the substance to start the genjutsu, intending to make him fall under the genjutsu's power, but leave out the torture part.

Suddenly, I felt a surge of power welling up from my eyes, then spreading all throughout my body. "On second thought, I'll prolong your agony for as long as possible. Your scream for mercy will be music to my ears," I heard myself say, cold and evilly. I walked toward him and he began to shrink back with a look of fear in his eyes. Annoyed by his bonds, I turned the roses to ash with a snap of my fingers, approaching him with each step.

I held my right hand out to my side. A long black apparition appeared and hardened into an obsidian spear. I could feel the ice-cold aura emanating from it. The power felt good. I threw the spear at him, and it passed cleanly through his belly and out the other side. He threw up blood, his body wracked with coughs that brought up mouthfuls of dark red liquid. He raised his hand in surrender as he started to sway on his feet.

"The match is over. Riku Tomoko is the victor," the proctor said. I instantaneously saw the spear fade away, and the cold, raw power was sucked back into my eyes. I suddenly felt exhausted. I started swaying, even though I willed myself to stand up straight. I waved off the med-nins ready to take me to the infirmary should I need to go, and two of my friends jumped down to aid me in getting back up to the railing. I slid down the wall to sit on the floor, leaning against the wall with Yumi sitting on my left. The second of the two helpful friends sat down on my other side, to my right.

"I scared you earlier, huh?" he teased. I leaned my head on Yumi's shoulder.

"Shush up," I mumbled, ready to fall asleep but attempting to fight it. "Glad to see you're okay, Kazu."

The darkness pulling my heavy eyelids shut prevailed, and I fell asleep quickly.


	16. Ch 16: The 6th and 7th Matches

Ch. 16: The Sixth and Seventh Matches

* * *

"Yawn…" I woke up, trying to stay still for as long as I could. I listened to the sound of metal clashing on metal, and decided I wanted to watch the match. I was about to open my eyes when I realized a few things.

I fell asleep with my head tilted on the left. I was now leaning to the right.

The shoulder my head was resting on was considerably bonier and higher up (taller) than Yumi's, and

The flashing lights coming through my eyelids—cameras.

I cracked one eye open, and sure enough—there was Washi, snapping away and cackling at the blackmail opportunities. I soon solved that with a thrown kunai slicing through the camera along with all of the printed photos in his hands. He looked up in the direction that the kunai came from, about to give the offender a piece of his mind. Staring straight at me, his jaw dropped.

"Oh shit," he mouthed, then he ran off. _Yeah, you better run!_ I straightened out, stretching my stiff limbs and back. I turned my head to my right.

"So, Kazu, care to explain why when I woke up, you were replacing Yumi?"

"Huh?" He opened his eyes, blinking away sleep. "Wait, where am—oh, right. She had to go about 15 minutes ago."

"Why?" I was soon answered by the proctor's announcement.

"Nanami Mayumi vs. Tokomi Kohei."

From about eight yards away from us, Kohei hopped down to the arena level. Yumi was nowhere to be found. As a matter of fact, Yumi, Washi, _and_ Deki were missing. Kaida was still in the infirmary, so Kazu and I were the only ones from our group that were present. Suddenly, Washi rushed in, panting, then yelled to the proctor, "Don't start the match yet! She's on her way!"

Sure enough, Yumi soon appeared. But, this time she had a large clay jug on her back. She jumped down to ground level. "Ready," she said, assuming a familiar battle position. The proctor called the match to a start.

The battle started simply enough. They circled, watching the other closely and mirroring each other's movements. Then, Yumi uncorked the jug. I understood where they had been and why she was carrying it. The jug was filled with water, deadly water that was frothing fiercely because of the chakra it was infused with.

"So, I hear you've been perfecting your ice jutsu," Kohei broke the silence.

"Yeah, did you know it's a mixture of water and wind elements?" Yumi asked him.

"Of course! After all, I'm a fellow ice user." Kohei pulled up some water from under the ground, then froze it into a crystal sheet in midair.

"Pitiful," Yumi sneered. "I mean, you've lived in the Water Country _AND_ the Wind Country, yet you can't even use ice jutsus properly?" I slightly winced inwardly. Even though I'd known her for at least eight years, she usually used a voice that was two or three tones higher than her real voice. Consequently, I often forgot how mean and cruel she could be, and how NOT innocent she really was.

"You even have one parent from each village," Yumi continued, "And that's the best you can do? Now take a look at me! I don't even have _any_ connections to _either_ of the villages!"

It was true. I was one of the few people who actually knew her story. Her father was a missing-nin, and because of guilt by association, she and her mother got dragged into the muddle. Her mother had fled to a number of different villages for differing amounts of time, some longer than others. The Mist Village was one that wasn't one of the longer stays, but Yumi had grown so attached to the people and the friends she had made there, that when the whole business was cleared up a few months later, her mother had come right back to the Mist, bringing Yumi with her. Even as her best friend, I still didn't know where either of her parents were from. I only knew that she didn't wish anyone to know, and I was fine with that.

"Oh yeah? I bet I could easily beat you on terms of skills," Kohei countered.

"Then let's see it," Yumi challenged.

Kohei made a few handsigns. Out of nowhere, a large mass of water appeared. "I've been working on this one for the longest time. Got it by combining one of my mom's water jutsus with my dad's wind jutsus." He used the wind element to blow the water over to where Yumi was, effectively chilling and freezing the water as soon as it reached its spot in the glass-like dome he was forming around and over her. "Now how are ya gonna get outta that?" Kohei asked haughtily.

"Like this." Yumi smirked while rapidly making handsigns. She finished, formed a ring with her index finger and thumb, brought it up to her lips, inhaled deeply, then blew out. Flames quickly melted the ice into water.

"As a matter of fact, I'll just get rid of all the water I brought with me. I won't need a single drop of it to beat you." Controlling the water, she pulled it out of the jug and launched it in an arc across the arena. She repeated the rapid handsigns and inhaled even deeper before exhaling forcefully, driving out a humongous ball of flame through her finger ring. All of the water she had tossed into the air disappeared, evaporated in the atmosphere.

"Now let me show you an ice jutsu that you'll have never heard of, seen, or will never hear of or see ever again. I formed it in the year I turned six, and have been perfecting and adding to it ever since. No, I haven't based it off of anything like _some_ incompetents," BOY, was she nasty, "but it's a completely original jutsu I developed myself." She smirked again before performing the most complex sequence of handsigns I had ever seen, and so rapidly that I had a hard time keeping up, even with the Sharingan Disk. She even used some handsigns that I had never seen before, ones that I was sure didn't exist before she created them.

A gigantic, and I mean GIGANTIC whirlpool made of tons and tons of water swirled dangerously above her head, forming a cone shape filling her angled, up-stretched hands. Then to my surprise, she lowered it, bringing it lower and lower until the fiercely spinning water drove into her body. A second later, it had all suddenly disappeared, soaked into Yumi's body. She studied her nails, grinning wickedly. "That water was made from pure chakra. And as chakra, even though it was in liquid form, my system soaks it up just as easily."

"Shit," Washi muttered from where he had 'appeared' next to me. He was leaning on the railing, same as Kazu and I were, and Deki was on his other side. "With that much chakra in her network, she highly unstable. She's either gonna have to do something drastic to get rid of it all, or she's gonna need a major draining when this battle is over." It was very likely to be the second option, although Yumi had never been one to go for small, inconspicuous things. Deki just looked confused.

"I'll explain later!" I talked around Washi.

Back on the battle floor, Yumi was showcasing her jutsu's abilities. She could siphon out water through her hands, freeze it solid with a clench of a fist, then melt it back and soak it right up with a simple snap of her fingers. While she showed off, she talked to Kohei, then raised her voice loudly so the whole arena and its occupants could hear. "It's not just short range. It works long distance as well."

She lifted her left hand in the air and made a swiping motion. 15 yards away, water appeared, surrounding Kohei and capturing him tightly in a left-handed fist-shaped mass of water. With a snap of her right hand, it froze solid, trapping Kohei. She was now the sadistic cat, playing with the mouse that had no chance of escape.

"For my next trick," she projected, with added flair for her audience, "some archery—with a twist," she added with an evil grin. She took her right hand and swiped downwards in a slightly curved line. She snapped her fingers, then quickly closed her fingers around a slender bow. She brought up her left hand, and using a finger, touched one end, dropped it downwards to the other end, and tapped her foot against the ground, creating a delicate string made of ice and given flexibility with her chakra. She switched hands, holding the bow with her left hand and leaving her right hand free.

"Now, what is the companion of a bow?" She held her palm towards the sky, in front of her as if she was about to offer a gift to the heavens. From the feathers up, a slim, crystal clear arrow filled itself up like a mold would with water. Another finger snap, only for show, as I knew by now, and the sharp rod of ice fell into her waiting hand. She positioned the arrow, aimed the bow, pulled back her right arm, then released her fingers. The tension stored up in the chakra-reinforced string propelled the arrow forward. At the last second, a section of Kohei's icy bonds turned back to water to allow the arrow to embed itself in Kohei's thigh, turning the water to a tainted, impure, clouded reddish tinge before it froze again. I tried not to gag.

Kohei cried out in pain.

"Give up!" Yumi suggested nonchalantly, studying her nails again.

"No!" Kohei refused.

Yumi turned the bow into liquid and reabsorbed it. She clawed the air in front of her with her left hand, looking just like a cat batting at an enemy. From next to Kohei, a water dragon with icy fangs appeared, swaying like a majestic snake before it bites, following the motions of Yumi's arm. Just as before, the ice encasing Kohei melted just to let the dragon's head through so the dragon could sink its teeth into the flesh of his right side. By now, I could also tell that Yumi's arms could be strapped to her body and she'd still be able to control her creations by manipulating the chakra running from different spots on her body out to the thing.

"Surrender!" Yumi commanded, idly forming, melting, and reforming a katana with her left hand.

"I will not!" Kohei struggled. Yumi walked over to him, turning the katana solid in her left hand and passing it to her right. Unlike before, an area of ice didn't liquidize. Instead, Yumi just stabbed the blade right through the ice, into Kohei's left shoulder, above his thigh wound. The katana came right through the other side.

"Admit defeat," Yumi said darkly while Kohei bit back another cry in pain. It was no longer a suggestion or a command. He no longer had a choice.

"Never," Kohei said as defiantly as he could.

Yumi took a fist, jerked it around the right to the side of Kohei's head, and stabbed a senbon, a manufactured metal one, into his neck, right into a certain pressure point, with extreme accuracy. Kohei's head lolled to the side. He was unconscious and unable to continue the match. The proctor declared Yumi's victory. Yumi melted up every last bit of ice, leaving two empty wounds and numerous puncture marks, but leaving the senbon for the medics to remove. All of the chakra-generated water went back into Yumi's body, leaving Kohei's body to fall limply into the ready arms of a med-nin. Yumi rejoined the four of us.

"We explain now," she said, still using her real voice's lower tone. The three boys looked at her confusedly, while I nodded. "Deki, Washi—"

"Next match: Washi Warami vs. Takasashi Botan."

"Damn!" Yumi swore. "Why the hell do we keep on getting interrupted?"

I shrugged. "At least we know that he and Deki aren't battling each other."

"Yeah, I guess," Yumi sighed. Then she snickered.

"What?" I asked.

"His name, Botan, means peony!" she giggled, her attitude a complete turnaround from before.

"You mean like the flower?"

"Yeah!"

I laughed along with her.

Still wearing a bewildered expression, Washi took his place on the ground as his opponent celebrated his turn finally arriving.

"Yes!" Washi's opponent exclaimed. "I finally get to do my one-on-one battle! And it isn't some weak girl either!"

"Not yet!" I heard Deki yell. Washi immediately turned red, glared, and flipped Deki off, but Deki was too busy laughing to notice. I turned to Yumi and smiled teasingly.

"By the way, was the short dress really necessary?" I asked quietly. She giggled in the high-pitched tone usually associated with her perverted side. Oh heck, alright, her _normal_ side. "Do I even _want_ to know?"

She shook her head and I took her word for it.

The proctor started the match, and the flower kid started attacking immediately. Washi easily blocked the attacks, barely even trying. The boy stopped to pant.

"Wow, you must be tough for none of those hits to get you!" he commented.

Washi responded by blasting out a gigantic fireball. Botan yelped and jumped out of the way just in time.

"Hey, how come you Mist kids don't yell out the names of your attacks?" Botan asked accusingly.

"First of all, don't call me a kid. I bet I'm older than you. Second, why would I tell you?"

_It's for stealth and surprise attacks,_ my mind supplied.

"Aw, no fair!" Botan whined. The kid was starting to remind me of his curly-haired opponent.

"Wow, you're annoying," Washi commented. _Look who's talking…_ "Well, I might as well have a little fun with this. I'll even say the technique's name—it's no secret…" He trailed off. He made the simple handsigns. "Transformation Jutsu!" And there was the skinny brunette with the short red dress.

"Pff," Botan seemed unimpressed. "What's that supposed to do? Make me laugh? Let me show you the real deal. Scary Jutsu!" And there was a cute little kitten.

"Meow." Poof. "Wait-wait-WAIT! NO! IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A TIGER!" he cried, pouting.

"Transformation Jutsu!" Washi retaliated, snickering. When the smoke disappeared, the girl he was disguised as was the same, except with her hair up. He, er, she, was holding three shot glasses, the true receivers of the jutsu. In truth, they were vials of different substances. Washi had just tied her, heheh, hair under the cover of the cloud.

"You taught him that?" Yumi nodded in the affirmative.

"Would you like one?" Washi asked, using a higher, sweeter, more innocent and—I spluttered as soon as I thought this—seductive tone. "It'll make this battle more fun!"

"Cool, refreshments!" Botan stopped sulking and received the vial all too willingly. He gulped it down, and, as expected, fell to the ground unconscious. Washi turned himself back and retrieved the glass container from Konohamaru's hand.

"Match goes to Washi Warami!"

"Well, that was weird," Yumi commented.

"Agreed," I answered.


	17. Ch 17: The Confrontation

Ch. 17: The Confrontation

* * *

Again, the nameplates on the board went spinning, and landed on…

Kumizo Hana vs. Kinsu Himawari.

I ignored their fight, since I knew neither of them, and instead grabbed Deki's elbow and Washi's shirt collar. Yumi followed as I dragged them into a hallway that led off of the viewing floor. After doing a double take with us missing, Kazu ran after us. I released Washi and Deki.

"Sit," Yumi commanded irritatedly. Washi immediately followed her order, but Deki stayed standing, leaning against the wall. Kazu burst into the scene.

"Hey, what are you—"

"Sit." He sat.

I started pacing in front of them like a lawyer presenting his case to a jury. "At some time today, Shimi Hideki encountered Warami Washi lip-locked with Yumi Nanami. What does the prosecutor have to say?"

"Umm, Tomoko—there _is_ no prosecutor," Yumi said.

"Oh, yeah, sorry. I meant Deki, since _he_ probably would want to do the accusing more," I spoke softly, conferring with Yumi. She nodded in agreement. "Deki, what do _you_ have to say? Is there anything you would like to know?"

"I'd like to know just what the hell is going on," he deadpanned.

"As in this, or something that happened earlier?"

"Both. What's going on now, and why the fuck I caught Warami kissing Yumi." Kazu nodded in agreement.

"Oh boy," Washi said with mock enthusiasm.

"You can say that again," I said in response. "But don't."

"Well, you know how Washi has had relatively low chakra levels since he was a child?" Yumi started. Deki and Kazu nodded. "Well, while that is not a good thing, he got with it the ability to feed off of other peoples' chakra."

"By kissing them and channeling it from their mouth to his mouth," I added.

"Okay. But why _you_?" Deki asked.

"Well, since _I_ was a child, I've often had chakra levels that are too high. Washi gets along just fine with slightly low chakra levels, but I become very unstable when there's too much chakra in my system. So instead of working all of that chakra off and tiring my body—"

"Washi takes the excess for you," Deki finished, interrupting Yumi.

"Well, yeah."

"Hey, Deki, I think that's the first time you've called Washi 'Washi'!" I exclaimed with excitement.

"Don't get used to it," Deki warned.

"Tomoko, you are SOOO random," Yumi commented.

"Thank you!"

"It wasn't a compliment," she said, grinning.

"But then you'd be insulting yourself, right?" I answered in the usual routine, grinning back.

"I don't think the match is over yet. Should we go watch?" Yumi inquired.

"Nah, there's something more important about to happen," I said, winking at Deki. He nodded then drew a deep calming breath.

"Well, I heard that Kumizo Hana has a pretty good taijutsu technique," Yumi said, just as Deki was about to speak. He tried again.

"Y—"

"I also heard she possesses a kekkei-genkai." Deki looked discouraged.

"Try again!" I whispered to him.

"Yu—"

"And, I also heard that the Himawari girl is on the same team as that Botan kid." Deki caught my eye.

"Go on!" I encouraged him quietly. He drew another breath, then blurted out her name and a few words, only to be shushed by Yumi, who was apparently listening in on a conversation. She giggled.

"Apparently that one girl, Haruhi, just hooked up with one of her teammates…" Her babbling drowned out Deki's fifth attempt. By now, even Washi and oblivious Kazu were aware, and feeling bad for Deki. Yumi went silent, allowing for Deki to start for the sixth time, then she started talking. Again. Simultaneously, the three of us, not including Deki, yelled at her.

"STOP TALKING AND (FUCKING) LISTEN!" (The curse was from Washi, of course).

"Yumi." Yumi looked genuinely surprised, as if she was realizing for the first time that Deki was trying to communicate with her. I didn't doubt that it was true, either.

"What, Deki?"

"Well, you were the first female friend I made, and you always looked out for me and we were great friends and all and everything and you'd always talk to me and you always remembered my pills and you'd calm me down when I got angry or annoyed and you were always nice to me," Deki paused for a breath and hesitated, not knowing how to go on, when Washi broke the continuity of the confessional speech.

"Wait, what pills?" As tactful and with as great timing as ever.

The reply was unanimous. "Shut up, Washi!"

Deki launched back into his speech and rambled on, and on. "…And you cried with me when my dog died and were happy with me when I got a new one, and I guess I've liked you ever since we were first friends and I'd like to ask you out on a date and I hope you will say yes." He looked to me for approval. I gave him a double thumbs up and an encouraging smile. He smiled back, an anxious smile, and looked back at Yumi, who was still trying to process the question.

"You… are asking me out," she stated as more of a fact than a question. Deki nodded nervously. She pondered over it for even longer as the tension grew and grew until you could cut it with a kunai.

"Oh, just hurry up and answer!" I groaned, my limited patience getting the better of me.

"All right, all right! … Sure. I guess I can go out with you. Say, tonight?"

I've never seen Deki happier than he was at that moment.

With a grin that threatened to split his face in half, he added, "Oh yeah, we can double date with Kazu and Tomoko since he said they were going out too!"

My eyes instantly narrowed. I turned upon Kazu. "And just _when_ did this happen?" I spoke slowly and deliberately, in a dangerous tone. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Deki mouth the word 'oops.' _Yeah,__ '__oops.__'_

Kazu grinned nervously, his gaze flickering from my dark glare to the couple standing next to me, his eyes clearly reading 'help!' "Umm…" he said, treading carefully. _Yeah, __you__'__re __walking__ on __some__ thin __ice._ "…Right now…?" he asked, unsure of himself.

"Is that a question or a statement, Nisi?" I barked out.

"A statement?"

"Say it like you mean it!"

"Okay, okay! Riku Tomoko, will you go on a date with me?" he asked, still wavering on the last word. I shifted my weight to one leg, then the other, and pretended to consider it, keeping my demeanor ominous.

"Nnnnn…yes!" I exclaimed, immediately skipping around joyfully, smiling cheerfully.

"Phew," Kazu exhaled in relief.

"Too bad for you," Deki commented.

"Tell me about it, I just _had_ to like the most bipolar girl in all of the great ninja villages…"

"What was that?" I snapped at him.

"Umm…nothing…"

"Alright…" I said lightly. "But don't forget it," I warned. He forced a smile and nodded. I let a wide grin grow on my face. "I'm just messing with you!" I smiled toothily and his ears turned red in embarrassment. "Oh, and you need to remember to control your emotions better. I can tell them all by your EARS!" I teased. The blush spread to his cheeks. "Well, I'm off to see who the next opponents will be!" I skipped down the hall, grinning cheekily.

"Hey, Shikamaru says that Naruto's got a major crush on that one pink-haired girl, Sakura, and you know how Yumi gets that one week every month…" Deki's consolation floated down the passage to my ears.

I still heard Kazu muttering to himself as I turned the corner. "What have I gotten myself into…?"


	18. Ch 18: Accidents

Ch. 18: Accidents

* * *

As soon as I was back to our spot, I nudged someone standing nearby with my elbow. "Who won the last match?"

"Kumizo Hana."

"Thanks," I murmured distractedly, focused on the spinning panels about to announce the next two fighters.

"What, you don't recognize me?"

Surprised, I spun around and found myself face-to-face with—"You?"

"Depends on who 'you' is." The person was my height, my age, had wavy blond hair, and bright blue eyes.

"You're the one from my dream!" I gasped, not realizing how odd the statement sounded.

"Well, yes. I was born with the ability to speak to people in their dreams."

"Kekkei-genkai?"

"Yeah."

"How did you know who I was?"

"Well, I was the former owner of the Taiyou, and because of that, I am able to know who it moved to after me!"

"The Taiyou?" I was officially confused.

"That's why I told you that you were chosen! Because you were!"

"Chosen for the Taiyou," I deadpanned.

"Right, sorry, that's the name of the genjutsu where your eyes turn purple."

"Yeah, I knew that!…not really…" I got distracted again, looking across the battle floor to where some of my newer friends were crowding around…Washi, who was holding…two photographs.

"Excuse me for a second."

I walked until I was right behind him. The crowd immediately grew silent, but Washi hadn't noticed. I reached towards my weapons pouch and spoke up in a high-pitched, timid tone. "May I see what you are looking at, Warami-kun?"

"Oh yeah, of course!" He turned around to hand me the pictures, expecting a much shorter person, then froze as he took in a purple-clothed stomach instead of a face, then, eyes traveling upwards, took in the red stitching in the purple fabric, and then the dark, extremely pissed-off glare. I pried the pictures out of his loosened grip and looked to see what they were of. The first picture, a mistake, showed a thin pair of arms moving my head somewhere, both Kazu and I asleep. He must have drugged me, or else I would have woken up. The second picture showed the results of the actions in the first. What was the second picture? Kazu sleeping, legs criss-cross-applesauce, leaning against the wall, and me, lying alongside the same wall, legs extended and my head lying…in Kazu's lap.

"Warami," I said sweetly, feigning kindness as I used someone's cigarette to set fire to and burn up the photos.

"Yes?" he answered fearfully.

"You're _so_ dead."

In a matter of heartbeats, I had him pinned to the wall with kunai stuck through his clothing, and I had another kunai up to his neck. It was then that I noticed a commotion by the door. I lowered the kunai and yanked the other ones out of the wall, then turned. "You got lucky this time." I ran to see what was going on, just in time to see Sarutobi-san stride through the door. He scanned the room, and once he spotted me, he beckoned for me to come to the doorway. I did as he motioned and made my way to the ever-growing crowd, on the edge of which I spotted him. Tsubasa. I grabbed his elbow and dragged him with me as I fought through the crowd, trying to get to Sarutobi-san.

Finally, I found myself in front of him. I released Tsubasa's elbow, and Sarutobi-san gave him the once-over.

"Who is this?" he asked warmly.

I noticed Tsubasa was starting to feel uncomfortable, so I leaned over and made a little something up. "Don't worry, he's a nice guy, like an old grandpa," I whispered. "Now introduce yourself!"

He smiled nervously, then opened his mouth to speak. I looked up at Sarutobi-san's expectant face. He gave me a knowing look. "Well, um, er…my name is Tsubasa. Nekowa Tsubasa."

Sarutobi-san stiffened very slightly at the sound of his last name, but poor Tsubasa was too busy mumbling out incoherent sentences to realize it. Sarutobi-san spoke up gently, interrupting him. "Why did you bring him to me?" he asked conversationally.

"Well, you wanted information on the true legendary Mangekyou Sharingan, so I thought you might want to talk to him," I said, shrugging my shoulders.

"Was he not your—"

"Twin brother, yes, but I have something to add. The original legend about the Mangekyou only working around the current host of the Taiyou is wrong. It will also work if in contact with anyone who has ever had it, and if it has at any time been exposed, it will continue to work until passed on to another person, in which case it will 'reset.' So Akuma was able to use it since birth. He hit me with it, but it had already moved from me soon after I was born, so it only sent me into torture instead of getting rid of the Taiyou."

"Only?" I exclaimed incredulously.

"Tomoko, bring Tsubasa with you to my office as soon as your last two teammates battle."

"Yes, Sarutobi-san."

"Very well, see you then." With that, the formerly retired Third Hokage strode swiftly back out of the entrance. To my surprise, Kaida walked in as soon as Sarutobi-san had left.

"I'm back! Miss me?"

After the excitement at her return, everyone soon turned back to the match that had already started, and we 'Mist Six' as Tsubasa nicknamed us, were back at the spots we were originally at. Well, for the most part, we were clumped in the spots we had at the beginning of the matches. The match currently going on was between a Zogiri Itsuki, the earth user who I had correctly classified before the First Exam, and Kokano Michiko, a thin girl from Suna.

After I introduced Tsubasa, I was surprised by how well he fit in the group. After all, he defused an argument between Washi and Deki by making Washi laugh at jokes that really weren't offensive to anyone, then stretched Deki's brain with anagrams and puzzles that none of us had ever heard before. Kazu he entertained by acting out stories, he impressed Kaida with his knowledge of weaponry, and he even kept Yumi and I interested by making up absurd ways to kill people with the weapons and the most random objects. We barely even noticed Washi and Yumi going aside to take care of Yumi's chakra issue. _Barely_. Meaning Deki bent five senbon into 'V's at the same time, then jabbed each one into the concrete, while Kazu and I stood ready to hold him back if he lunged, until Tsubasa calmed him down with another brainteaser.

Yeah, you really don't want to be around when he has his male version of PMS. The last time it happened—Kazu got kicked through a wall while I got hit with a lamp. Just because the mist was 'too thick.' Then again, it might have been because we ran out of his pills…

And then there was the time I lifted up and threw a bed through a wall, then ripped apart a phone book in rage the first time I got my female time-of-the-month.

And when one of the village bullies got Kazu riled up and extremely provoked, the disaster was about the same.

You know what, it just might have been the safest thing for your health to just avoid our team and our unpredictability in general. Yeah, that was probably a smart thing to do.

Anyway, we sat, waiting for the match to end and for Kazu and Deki's matches to come along, not really paying attention to what was going on. We started discussing the previous matches, and, out of the blue, Washi asked if anyone knew what had happened with Kaida's match. I was the only one who raised my hand, so the five others plus Tsubasa crowded around me, trapping me between the wall and themselves. Not like I was going to go anywhere.

I recounted the story, from when they were calling names, to the point where the weaponry came out, then ended with the med-nin carrying them both away.

"How come you could see all that stuff but I couldn't?" Washi asked.

"Dunno. Maybe because of this." I took out the Sharingan Disk, and as soon as I touched it, my senses, particularly my sight, sharpened.

"Cool, let me see that!" I let Washi hold it, a bad decision.

Within a second, he was on the ground, screaming muffled by Kazu's quick reaction of slapping a hand over his mouth.

"Wh-wha-what the—" Deki started stammering, _never_ a good thing. Kaida looked stunned, Yumi lost her balance in alarm, and ended up landing, hard, on her bottom.

"What the _fuck_ is happening?" Deki finally finished his sentence.

"The disk! Get it away from him! NO! Only Tomoko can touch it!" Tsubasa's voice snapped me out of my frozen shock. I snatched it from Washi's spasming fingers and stuffed it into my shuriken holster. Washi was still writhing on the ground.

"What do we do!" Yumi's hysterical half-scream sent Tsubasa into action, ordering us around.

"Tomoko, you're the only one who can do anything about it! Kazu, just put your foot under his head so it doesn't crash into the concrete, and keep him quiet!"

"But what do I do!" I wailed.

"Tomoko! Do what the med-nin did to Kazu!" Deki directed.

"I don't KNOW what she did!"

"_I_ do! She used the Mystical Palm Technique, it's a medical jutsu. The hand signs are Ox, Tiger."

I froze. Out of everything I had mastered through years of practice and experience, I had never memorized the handsigns. I could copy them quite easily, remember sequences and perform them, but I could never remember their names, or call out the order. It was like a person who knew phrases in sign language, but could never separate out the words or make his own sentences.

So in other words—Washi was as good as doomed for the moment.

Kazu and Deki realized my dilemma.

"Tomoko, Deki's doing the Ox handsign, and I'm doing the Tiger handsign. Just go from one to the other, then apply chakra to your hands. Not too much, not too little. Just enough to push the disk chakra into his system." Kazu's surprisingly composed demeanor helped me to calm myself.

"B-b-but the disk—"

"Just do it!"

I took the disk back out and put it on Washi's chest with shaking hands, followed the handsigns and put my hands on the disk. The glowing green chakra turned to the same orangey maroon as before, while I fervently hoped I was using the right amount of chakra. Washi's thrashing slowly stopped, so I took the disk and my hands off of his chest. He abruptly sat up with a scared, wild look in his eyes.

Already prepared, Deki dumped a vial of sedative into Washi's partially opened mouth. Washi's breathing slowed as did his racing heartbeat. When he had calmed down enough, Kaida asked if he was okay. He opened his mouth and spoke slowly.

"What… hell…"

"Don't you mean 'what _the_ hell?" Kaida asked. Washi shook his head 'no.'

"What hell… did I just go to?"

"Umm… just… I don't know…"

We noticed the people crowding around and staring at us.

"Nothing to see here, just watch the match! Sheesh! Nosy much?" Yumi was as polite as ever.

"We're _all_ going to see Sarutobi-san later," I said with finality. "Just hang on until Kazu and Deki's battles. After that, we'll go there." Everyone nodded, and we turned back to the battle.

Zogiri Itsuki, the earth user, had just locked Kokano Michiko in a rock dome.

"Been there, done that," I said, mostly to myself.

"Been _in_ there, done with that," Yumi said in response, referring to a mission back in Kirigakure that seemed to have happened years ago, though it really had occurred not even a month before. We both smiled, small smiles, still recovering from the scare and trying unsuccessfully to forget the ordeal as Kaida helped Washi up and he went to sit with the other three boys.

All of a sudden, we heard a shrill flute play. A fierce wind swept through, eroding the dome into plain dirt and sand. The next sequence of notes took that sand and drove it at the boy, Itsuki. He put up a rock slab as a shield. Michiko put down the flute, did a sequence of handsigns, and yelled, "Great Flood Jutsu!"

As a huge wave of water swept around the rock and engulfed Itsuki, Deki filled us in on their abilities. "Zogiri is an earth-user, as you can see, and Kokano can use some elemental jutsus, and her flute can be used to both control wind and cause genjutsus."

Sure enough, after doing a series of handsigns and yelling "Whistling Sands!" the next strain of notes caused Itsuki to fall to the ground, screaming. Yumi and I laughed at the sight of the large male screaming like a (baby) girl at the hands of the petite girl playing the small flute. Itsuki finally broke out of the genjutsu and jumped up, rocking a little unsteadily for a short second.

Then, to our surprise, Michiko removed the end of the silver instrument. The resulting sounds were very much higher, driving fiercer, sharper, more deadly, sharp winds towards Itsuki. His eyelids fluttered, squinting, to block out the intense, biting air force. Michiko started advancing, closer and closer, then threw sand into the cutting wind, causing Itsuki to screw his eyelids completely shut. The result was a gritty cloud of sharp, increasingly bloodier, blinding pain.

Unfortunately, Michiko was unable to see Itsuki barreling towards her through the cloud of grit.

We all heard a loud 'thud!' as the two bodies collided, then had to wait for the dust to clear before seeing the chaos. Somehow, Itsuki had ended up on his back with Michiko lying on top of him, and, at some point, their lips had met, and they were still connected. We looked on as Michiko's eyes widened, she shrieked, jumped up, and just as Itsuki started to get up, a chakra- and anger-powered fist knocked him into oblivion… and into the wall ten yards away.

"Match goes to Kokano Michiko." She was still screeching, and was now rubbing her mouth, spitting, and grimacing. Wonderful.

I caught a glimpse of that one girl, Yamanaka Natsumi, as she looked up at the same time. She was laughing. Hard. I started chuckling too, as did Yumi. I glanced up at the nameplates, only catching a glimpse.

"Hey, Kazu! You're up! Good luck." I heard a collective murmur go around at the name of his opponent.

"Nekowa?" Deki thought for a second. "Didn't Kazu already kill that guy?"

I was about to agree when I realized something. "Umm, Deki—he wasn't the only one with that last name."

"Good luck!" Tsubasa wished enthusiastically. "Oh, and I hear that this guy is a real hottie too."

Kazu looked at him oddly for a second, as if he was trying to figure out whether Tsubasa thought he was gay or if Tsubasa was gay. He shook his head to clear his thoughts before descending to ground level. I glanced up at the nameplates just as a confirmation of my suspicions. Sure enough, it read,

Nisi Kazuyuki vs. Nekowa _Tsubasa_.

As soon as Tsubasa joined Kazu on the battle floor, Deki announced to the other four of us remaining, "Well, I wonder what Tsubasa can do."

"What country is he from? I didn't see a forehead protector."

"Well Tomoko, if you had been observing him, you would've seen it sewn on his pants. He's from one of the villages in the Snow Country."

"Oh. Well thanks for saying that so considerately."

"You're welcome."

"Hey, is he on the same team as that Reiko guy?" Deki and I both looked at Yumi at the same time.

"I think so," Deki answered.

"Why?" I asked.

"It'd be pretty weird if they were three-for-three, wouldn't it? I mean, if everyone on your team fights someone on their team. I wonder who the last person on their team is?"

Kaida spoke up. "Maybe the girl screaming in the corner, cheering for 'Tsu-Tsu' is their teammate?"

I shrugged. "That reminds me, Washi, how are you feeling?"

"I think I might need to see a shrink."

"Why? Was it that bad?" Yumi asked.

"You don't want to know." She did anyway.

"Yes I do! Tell me tellme tellmtellmetellme—"

"FINE! Let's just say this—imagine Deki streaking—"

"Stop."

"—Across your front yard then colliding with that Itsuki guy-"

"Stop it."

"—Dressed in a tight skanky outfit—"

"STOP TALKING."

"—That includes any EXTREMELY short skirt—"

"SHUT UP!"

"…Yeah, multiply _that_ horror by about a hundred and you get how I feel."

Yumi, Kaida, me, AND Deki shuddered.

"Poor you." Understatement of the century.


	19. Ch 19: Unpredictability

Ch. 19: Unpredictability

* * *

As soon as the proctor started the match, things got weird. Tsubasa had yelled something about a "dream state," then cast a genjutsu over Kazu. Except that Kazu started laughing hysterically, literally rolling on the floor. Tsubasa was in no better state.

Then came the thrashing and screaming. Tsubasa finally got up off the floor, watching Kazu with a satisfied look on his face. "Now _that__'__s_ a jutsu only the heir to the Dream Shinobi Clan could perform. Dream State Conversion to Nightmare State. Complete." Realization dawned in Deki's eyes.

"What?"

"He put Kazu to 'sleep,' searching through his dreams, then discovered the nightmares. So this genjutsu—"

"Is literally his nightmares," I finished. I paled as I realized something. "Listen carefully to his screams and the way he's moving. Don't they remind you of something?" I winced when a particularly shrill shriek pierced the air.

"Umm…" Yumi and the rest of her team were stumped. Of course, they weren't the ones who had to sleep in a tent next to him for the duration of an espionage mission, which, by the way, failed miserably. Not that we were going to blame him.

"Oh god," Deki remembered in horror. "The week after _that_."

I nodded. "I guess both Washi _and_ Kazu may need some counseling after today. He's a goner."

"No—don't be so sure. Remember what happened after he shrieked?" Deki asked.

"He—started attacking anything with a chakra signature, even though he was asleep."

"And where is Tsubasa?"

"…Right in front of his face."

Kazu immediately began to lash out at whatever had a chakra presence and was in reach. So, in other words, Tsubasa. As Tsubasa fell, I caught a glimpse of his eyes. They were gold, fading back into blue.

"He's escaped."

Deki sighed in relief.

Almost immediately, Kazu's eyes popped open. "What did you do to them!" His voice was raw from both screaming and emotion. "Where are they! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH THEM!"

"Is he talking about his—parents?"

"No," his eyes widened as he recalled what Kazu had confided in him, but not me. "He's talking about _us_."

The response was unanimous. "KAZU! We're up here!"

"We're both fine!"

"They are!"

"Kazu, the Fleeting Swan!"

Both Kazu and I stared at him in shock. He _never_ approved of the moves or move names we made without consulting him. Yet there he was, yelling for Kazu to do the one move he despised the name of the most.

Kazu grinned widely, then saluted Deki. "Aye-aye, Cap'n!"

He took a defensive stance, right arm extended, his hand at chest level, left arm down, hand in front of his thigh. His left leg was in front of the right, and his knees were bent. I sat back, getting ready to enjoy the performance. Once he was satisfied with his footing, Kazu motioned with his right hand in the universal "bring it on" gesture.

Now it was time for the fun to begin.

Tsubasa rushed forward, ready to take Kazu head-on. But Kazu was gone—a second more, then he reappeared behind Tsubasa. He did a sequence of handsigns so fast I couldn't see them—at least since I wasn't holding the Sharingan Disk.

"Fleeting Swan Jutsu!"

One of Kazu's family-line skills was that he could find water from anywhere. He did so now, launching himself in the air, water sparkling as it followed the arc of his jump. He executed a neat flip and landed back in front of Tsubasa, then launched straight into a series of kicks, punches, and sideswipes, timed in a way so that each would hit as the water from the previous action muffled, blurred, or disabled each of his senses, so that he couldn't block. I think I even saw some slaps thrown in there.

Finally, the wet attacks slowed and came to a stop. It was time for my favorite part. Kazu leaped up once more, but this time, the water formed bird-like wings around his arms as he made a final few handsigns.

"Great Water Wing Attack Jutsu!"

The wings disintegrated into silvery feathers of water, with fine, sharp edges that cut through the skin as each swooped down and found its mark. Kazu gently soared back to the ground, landing softly in front of Tsubasa's teetering body.

"Congratulations, you win," Tsubasa said, smiling wryly. One swift hit to the back of his neck, and the heir to the Dream Shinobi Clan fell to the ground.

"Match goes to Nisi Kazuyuki."

We cheered him and consoled him when he joined us on the balcony, then waited for something exciting to happen.

It did. It happened quickly, too.

We glanced up at the nameplates that now read, "Shimi Deki vs. Masado Atsuko." Yumi had predicted correctly, but almost immediately, Atsuko became a surly, hostile creature of pure muscle. It was scary. And nearly instantly after the proctor called start, she had a chokehold around Deki's neck. This was not Deki's preferred style of fighting. He liked to sit back and observe his opponent instead of going up close and personal. His favored method was to plan a strategy instead of rush in headlong.

But he hadn't survived more than eight years around two slightly bipolar girls (with violent tendencies) without picking up some tricks. He used one now. He opened up his mouth, struggling to lift his hand up to his face, and gave his palm one nice, long, wet lick, making sure Atsuko saw. Then, he reached backwards to touch her, her grip temporarily loosened out of curiosity. It was only after he did that, that he announced to her, "I licked a piece of dog shit earlier today!" He opened his mouth again, attempting to lick her.

The response was swift. She shrieked, jumping away, ripping off her outer layer of clothes and throwing them away from herself, avoiding Deki like the plague. Behind me, I heard Washi chuckle.

"What?"

"_I_ taught him that." He grinned. I grinned back.

I wondered what course of action he would take from here on out. Maybe he'd take advantage of the arena in order to knock out his opponent. Deki preferred to be resourceful and show off just how clever he really was.

After some time, he was ready. He reached into his hip pouch, fingering some shining ninja wire, then launched it. Atsuko dodged the shuriken attached to the ends, but was not prepared for the water clone that waited to trap her. Trap her it did, and Deki wound the wire around both of them, finally dispelling the clone when the wire tightened to the point of drawing blood.

Still holding the wires taut, Deki walked up to her, passing the wires to hold between his teeth, then making some handsigns. "Bloodwater Manipulation Jutsu," he muttered around the wires, not caring so much about stealth and secrecy. He twitched his fingers, and her mouth opened. He unclenched his other fist and sound came out.

"I…f-forp—pf—feh—ee—tuh."

Deki growled in impatience and tried again.

"I forfeit."

The proctor nodded.

"Match goes to Shimi Hideki."

Deki's face contorted into a nasty smirk before he dispelled the jutsu and released the wires. He walked over to her and picked up the coil of wire, watching Atsuko as she threw a temper-tantrum. He then took a finger, licked it, then touched Atsuko on the nose. She shrieked even more. As he joined us, he began to laugh.

"I don't care who's fighting next, we're leaving. _NOW,_" I commanded, grabbing Kazu and Deki's wrists and dragging them. At the door, I stopped. "Where is the infirmary?" I asked the jounin stationed at the door.

"You must stay in here until the battles are all finished." He gestured back into the room.

"It's an order from the Hokage," a disinterested voice drawled out. I looked to see who it was.

_Pineapple-ponytail? But he's an adult, not a kid!_

He grunted. "I'm Shikamaru's dad. Call me Shikaku. Shimi, Nisi, Sou, Nanami, Riku," he acknowledged, nodding at each of us in turn.

"Hey, you know who we are?"

"Yes, it would seem that we both are acquainted with the goons up at the entrance security."

"Yeah!" Yumi exclaimed, grinning impishly. "You wouldn't believe what scaredy-cats they are!"

"You played a prank on them," Shikaku-san stated more than asked. Yumi grinned even wider. "How troublesome…"

"Well," he said, turning to the jounin, "The Hokage has instructed for that one," he pointed at me, "and 'Nekowa' to report to her office. Where _is_ this 'Nekowa'?" he asked, turning to me.

"Tsubasa's in the infirmary," I said. "But—my teammates are coming with me. _All_ of them," I said, gesturing to all five people behind me.

"Troublesome…" he muttered. "Fine. Now let's go, the Hokage is a busy man."

We smiled, nodded, then followed him out the door.

"So…" Yumi broke the silence as we followed Shikaku-san.

"Nara? Just _how_ did your son get to be so lazy that he was late for our shogi match? Sure, he beat me, but _how_ is he so lazy?" Deki asked. "And if he got it from you, how have _you_ survived?"

"Don't know," he shrugged, "maybe because I've got a wonderful, but extremely strong-willed woman as a wife? I think she's just made our son a little resentful towards women."

"I sympathize with you," Washi muttered under his breath. I laughed.

When we arrived at the infirmary, Shikaku-san asked what room Tsubasa was in. Just as the receptionist nearly finished telling us, "He is not allowed to have visitors," Deki interrupted her.

"Room 215, right?" When the receptionist continued to stare openmouthed, Deki nodded. "All right guys, this way."

We reached the second floor, then the eighth door on the right. We walked in just as Tsubasa was about to leave.

"Hey Tsubasa!" Kazu greeted him, and they bumped fists.

"Well you're friendly, considering Kazu kicked your ass," Washi commented. Yumi smacked him upside the head.

"Sorry," I apologized on their behalf. Tsubasa just grinned.

"No problem. Hokage's Tower, right? So are we leaving or not? I heard you from down the hall."

We all looked at Shikaku-san, who shrugged, then began leading us to Sarutobi-san's office.

Once we were a few yards away from the infirmary, Kazu, Deki, and Washi all immediately turned on Tsubasa. Soon after a barrage of sharp projectiles, sharper words followed.

"Who the fuck are you, and what have you done with Tsubasa?" Kazu demanded.

"Yeah! Who are you?" Washi repeated.

"What are you talking about?" Tsubasa asked. Deki tossed a kunai that slit Tsubasa's arm.

"Deki! What are you doing to Tsubasa?" Yumi yelled. I glanced at Kaida, who had pulled out her katana, and then at Tsubasa, who—had assumed a taijutsu stance?

Suddenly, 'Tsubasa' charged at Yumi, who moved to dodge. Just as suddenly, the imposter froze.

"Shadow Possession Complete." Shikaku-san straightened up. "Explain yourself, or you will be interrogated, and that won't be fun," he recited boredly.

"I bet you'd just love to hear an explanation, wouldn't you, Mr. Genius?" Shikaku-san groaned, slouching, and causing the imposter to mimic his movements. Shikaku-san shot a look at Deki, who stepped closer, then nodded in understanding.

Deki took off, so we followed, with not so much as a glance backwards at the chunnin.

When we were a reasonable distance away, traveling by rooftops, Yumi voiced the question that was also on my own mind.

"How did you guys know?"

"Tsubasa would never bump fists," Kazu answered, as if it were obvious.

"And he didn't make a joke after I talked," Washi continued.

"We never spoke of our purpose within the hall, so he couldn't have heard," Deki concluded, naming the only reason us girls could understand.

"Huh?"

"It's a guy thing."

"Oh."

We sped along in silence for a bit. Upon encountering a particularly precarious rooftop, both Washi and I tripped. Yumi helped me up, but Washi and I laughed at each other.

"Nice going, Warami," Deki sneered. Wait, no, his mouth never moved. My head shot around to Kazu, who was wearing a nasty smirk I never wanted to see again.

With one swift movement, Kaida hit the back of his knee with the sheath of her katana. He fell, cursing, then suddenly went limp. Moments after, he was gritting his teeth at the pain.

"What the—" Deki muttered. Then he had a kunai up to my neck.

I barely caught up with the events in time to get a strong enough grip on Deki's wrist in order to keep him from going through with the action. Then a peculiar feeling came over me, and I was a prisoner in my own body, watching helplessly as I switched positions so I was behind Deki, holding the kunai up to his neck. And with my strength, he had no chance. Unless—

"Shadow Possession complete." Shikaku-san had captured all six of us, and Tsubasa as well, in his jutsu. I had the feeling of my body being left back to my control. Unfortunately, that meant someone else was about to become possessed. A moment passed.

Then Shikaku-san reached into his pouch with his right hand, then an imaginary pouch with his left to account for Kaida's left-handedness. We all had no choice but to do the same. Then up to our throats—the possessor meant to kill us all with one move. I struggled. Hard.

But the last thing I expected was for myself, and only myself, to be released from the shadow's grip. I looked up in surprise, only to see that the expressions of the seven still trapped were the same.

_Help._

I turned, and sprinted in the direction of the tallest building in the village.

The Hokage's Tower.


	20. Ch 20: Imposter Strikes Again!

Ch. 20: Imposter Strikes Again!

* * *

While I ran, I had one hand in my weapons pouch, around the packet of rose seeds. I shoved chakra into them until they were almost rupturing at the seams. I then prepared a knockout mixture of pollen.

When I reached the guards at the doors, I tossed the powder and they passed out. I crashed through the doors, then ran to the stairs. I needed to travel up. I remembered what the view from the window in his office was like, so I deduced the general location, and traveled that way. I found myself in a hallway with a ton of guards. I gathered my chakra to my feet, and sprinted, scattering the rose seeds behind me. When they started to yell, I spoke the activation word.

"Burst." They grew into a dense tangle of thorns. I finally got to the office. I slammed into the doors, only to realize they opened out, opened them, ignoring the throbbing pain in my forehead, then stepped through into the Third Hokage's office.

"You're late," he commented amusedly.

"You come with me. Now." Okay, so my tact wasn't the best. "I need your help!"

"What seems to be the problem?" he asked slowly, patronizingly.

I bristled, agitatedly running a hand through my hair to fix the part. "Well, 'what seems to be the problem' is that I just left my friends in a dead-lock _death_ situation, immobilized _fifteen_ guards, and ran _into_ double doors, trying to get help, only to have to speak to me in a _patronizing_ tone! I think you may want to see for yourself, and quickly too. Shikaku-san's a part of it too. And so is Tsubasa."

That got his attention.

"Explain."

"On the way. I'm leaving now, whether you're coming or not." And true to my word, I ran to the window by his desk, jumped out, and fell. I landed softly, then immediately started running. I allowed myself a relieved sigh when I heard footsteps behind me, but frowned when I heard the voice.

"What's the problem?" It was that one ANBU, Ferret-san. Still, it was much better than nothing.

"There's someone, he or she has the ability to possess one's body, then leave it and overtake another whose body is close by. When I left, he or she had control over Shikaku-san, who had my teammates and Tsubasa locked in the Shadow Possession Jutsu. The attacker had Shikaku-san hold a kunai up to his neck, causing the others to follow his movement."

"How did you escape?" Ferret-san asked.

"Not sure. I just know that I was struggling, and then I was free."

He nodded. We continued on in silence.

"There they are." I pointed.

They all still seemed to be trapped, but each of them, barring Shikaku-san, had an extreme look of concentration on their faces, seemingly keeping themselves, and in turn, Shikaku-san, from slitting their own throats.

Then Shikaku-san relaxed and dropped his arms, releasing the jutsu. I barely had time to gasp before Ferret-san had an arm around my shoulders and a kunai up to my neck.

Instead of fighting, which could prove fatal to us both, probably having equal strength, I instead winked a conspiratorial wink at my friends before 'collapsing.'

Yumi started with 'concern' before yelling, "Shit! She collapsed!"

"Way to state the obvious!" Tsubasa shouted at her, understanding what I was planning.

"Then what would _you_ do?" Yumi yelled back. The others soon joined in the shouting match until all of their backs were turned, save Tsubasa's, but he was unable to see past the rest of the arguers.

Ferret-san, rather, the controller, let go of me, letting me slump to the ground, before slinking towards my friends. _Bingo._

I lunged for him, silently, and had just grabbed onto his leg when he tensed, surprised.

"What just happened?" he demanded.

"First, what did you get me for my skin upon our first meeting?" I asked.

He paused, thinking. "You had blood on your face, so I got you a damp towel." I nodded.

I turned to Deki next. _What__ did __I __answer __that __morning __we__ were __keeping__ watch?_

"Yes." I nodded my approval. "Who?"

He stopped, confused. "No one seems different."

_Sure?_ He nodded. "I think so."

"You still didn't answer my question about what just happened," Ferret-san pressed.

"Let's get to the Tower first," Deki interrupted.

We took off, Ferret-san first healing Kazu's knee with the green-chakra jutsu, and we finally arrived, pushing through the chaos. "Retract," I muttered under my breath, and the roses shrunk back into seeds.

"Just what did you _do_?" Yumi asked.

"Knocked out two guards and busied this hall with the roses. Hey, I was desperate!" I whispered in response to her incredulous expression.

This time, at Sarutobi-san's door, I made sure it was open before we filed through it.

"Now what was all that about?" Sarutobi-san asked conversationally, despite the fact that I had been so rude before. "Ferret?"

"They have yet to tell me."

"So?" he turned expectantly towards me.

"You see? I always get the blame!" I complained while waiting for Deki and Kazu to finish the task they had automatically set themselves to. Deki nodded. I turned to Sarutobi-san, who had an interested look on his face.

"They set up a few security jutsus of our own," I explained. He looked more interested.

"Never seen anything like them."

I shrugged. "Can't be too careful." He nodded in understanding.

"So?" he pressed.

"We were attacked by one who can take control of bodies. He or she started with Tsubasa, then…" I paused, not knowing what happened after that and before Kazu's sneer. I shivered at the memory.

"It took over me next," Kaida filled in.

"Then me," Kazu continued.

"Then it was Deki, then me, and then—"

"Me," Shikaku-san interrupted.

"Yes, and after Shikaku-san was 'possessed,' if you follow my terminology, I was freed from Shikaku-san's jutsu and I ran here. I apologize for my rudeness, but I was desperate," I explained to Sarutobi-san. "Once Ferret-san and I reached the battle, Ferret-san was possessed. We managed to trick the possessor and, after a few checks, made our way back here."

"Were there any information leaks?" Sarutobi-san asked.

"Not as far as I know. The identity-testing questions gave away nothing past that he brought me a damp towel the first time Ferret-san and I came into contact, and that Deki answered 'yes' to some question. Oh, and what Shikaku-san's jutsu was, and that I am stronger than Deki here," I answered. The others nodded.

"Nothing other than that," Kazu confirmed.

Washi spoke up. "He knew we were coming to the Tower."

Yumi and I looked at each other at the same time, both of us suspicious about the same thing. I alerted Deki to our plan. Yumi and I approached Washi, with Yumi latching onto Washi's arm.

"So, sweetie…" she dragged out the endearment, "I know this is a bad time, but you promised you'd tell me, so do you know where we're going for our _date_ tonight?" She fluttered her eyelids.

"Does Ichiraku's sound good to you?" he drawled, completely playing the part of a gentleman. Yumi and I struck.

"IMPOSTER!"

Immediately Washi's eyes went out then back into focus. He frowned. "Dude just left."

I turned to Deki. _Who?_

He just looked at me oddly. I sighed.

"I almost forgot, Deki, it's time for the team's daily tension-relieving. Come on, sit down, you know I don't bite." 'Deki' made his way to the chair, watching me warily. _Yet__ another__ mistake__—__Deki__ trusts __me __with__ his__ life._

"There you go!" I crowed, putting my hands on his shoulders to 'work out' the stress, actually manipulating chakra to make his muscles even tenser. I traveled the chakra pathways to his center. _Just __as__ I __suspected__…_ There was a slight hint of a foreign chakra signature lingering around his core.

"Sarutobi-san, it seems my usual treatment isn't working. Would you mind taking a look? Since you are so knowledgeable? Maybe you could take a look at this core muscles too?" I asked. Sarutobi-san looked at me suspiciously and put his hands on an anxious Deki's shoulders. It was all of two seconds before he shook his head in disappointment.

"Yamanaka. What are you doing?" 'Deki' grinned sheepishly, another thing Deki did NOT do.

"H-h-hey, Hokage-sama. I s-s-see that these y-youngsters are just f-f-fine. U-u-umm… Bye!"

Immediately Deki's face was indifferent.

_That you?_

"Yeah." Upon seeing the confused and suspicious looks on Kaida and Yumi's faces, he groaned. "Yes, Kazu, I _am_ Deki." We all sighed in relief.

"So, Tsubasa, what exactly do you know about the Mangekyou and the…"

"Taiyou?"

"Yes, the…Taiyou," Sarutobi-san said, as if confirming the name in his mind.

"Well, as I said earlier, the legends are wrong…"

I tuned out what I already knew and looked around the spacious room. My eyes settled on the thick oaken doors. Wondering if the wood would still respond, despite being dead, I curiously extended a tiny thread of chakra through the soles of my boots into the ground, and out towards the doors. Upon reaching one of them, I found a large amount of chakra imbued within it. _That_ was what keeps intruders out. I wondered if it would be at all possible to bypass the door if you _were_ an intruder. I searched with the tendril of chakra for a keyhole or something of the like. _Found __it._

Tinkering around a little, I felt a figurative 'click' as the lock came undone. The door was now unlocked and could be opened. Still, hopefully there was another layer of security.

"Tomoko, have you anything to add?"

"Oh, Sarutobi-san, if those doors were open, could anyone come marching through?"

Slightly puzzled, Sarutobi-san cautiously answered, "Yes, but they are hardly ever unlocked. Why?"

"I just unlocked them."

"What?"

"See!" I went to the doors and pushed on one. It swung open, outwards into the hallway. "You may want to add a secondary defense—maybe a chakra screen?"

Sarutobi-san looked amazed. "You'll have to show me how you unlocked it later on. But for the moment, Nekowa-san, what was it you wanted her to show me?"

"Tsubasa, please. Right, so Tomoko, do your genjutsu."

I immediately became somber. "But what if _it_ happens again?"

"Then I'll stop you. I promise. Now activate it."

"…Fine." I did the short string of handsigns and put my hands together in my signature "warning! I'm doing genjutsu!" position.

Tsubasa nodded approval. "Good. Now touch the Sharingan Disk."

"Alright…"

As soon as I touched it, I felt that raw power. I found that this time, though, I could control my hunger to use it.

"Now, stop touching the Disk."

"Promise you'll stop me?"

"I swear it."

"Okay." I took a calming breath and took my fingers off the metal. Immediately, the power surged and became ten times fiercer. The hunger for another's pain grew stronger too, and in the face of these feelings, I forgot everything but the power and my insatiable need to use it. The world was dull, but life was vivid. Life that could be made fearful. Life that could feel pain. I closed in on the taller blond boy. His stoic expression made him look like he'd be fun to break. But before I could do anything, I felt a breath of wind and a sharp pain in the back of my neck before the darkness overtook me.


	21. Ch 21: Out of a Tree

Ch. 21: Out of a Tree

* * *

I opened my eyes groggily, trying to figure out where I was why everything smelled so strongly of antiseptic. _Wait. White—beds—bright lights—antiseptic—…right._ The infirmary.

Sure enough, when my vision unblurred, I could see med-nins bustling about. And by my bed, there were Yumi, Washi, Kaida, Kazu, Deki, Tsuba—_wait. Deki._

"I'm so sorry Deki! Did I do it? Are you okay? Shoot shoot shoot—"

"Calm down, Tomoko. Remember? I promised I'd stop you."

"Right. Thanks, Tsubasa…"

Ayuka, the med-nin from before, came up behind Tsubasa. "Update."

"She just remembered what happened. Wait—what the Hokage and I discuss?"

"Umm… yeah… about that… I kinda zoned out…"

"That's the truth. How else do you think she did that stuff with the door?" Kazu asked.

"Yep—that's our Tomoko. Her most genius moments are when she spaces out or her head is in the clouds," Yumi added.

"Thanks," I muttered.

"You're welcome!"

"Riku-san, I took the liberty of using the Sharingan Disk to wake up Roshimi-san. I hope you do not mind."

Roshimi? Oh, right, opponent, big spear…

"Of course not, actually, I have two things to ask. First of all—wait, no, three things. First, did you check up Washi?" I asked, somewhat apologetic that I had forgotten until now.

"Yes, he will be just fine."

"Thank god. Now, how can you hold the Disk?"

"I keep a thin layer of chakra between it and my hands. Kind of like a glove."

"Alright," I responded, storing the information for later. "And now—may I please apologize to Roshimi-san?"

"Of course. And it may also interest you that the matches are over for today, and one of Shimi-san's water clones picked a number for you."

"Oh, I'll ask him about it later. So where is Roshimi-san?"

"Head right on over, Bed 3."

Having already brought myself to a sitting position, I slung my legs over the edge of the bed, stood up, shouted, "Race you!" and started running not even waiting for my friends to comprehend what I said.

And, of course, even with the head start…

Kazu beat me.

We attempted to be good sports about it by seriously shaking hands and saying, "Good game," but we failed miserably at that. I mean, at being serious, especially after one of the nurses turned to tell us 'Shh' but tripped and shrieked really loudly instead. Kazu caught her, but it was still really funny.

I finally turned toward the occupant of the bed and was met with a vacant stare. My mood immediately turned somber.

"I am so sorry, Roshimi-san. I didn't mean to do what I did—"

"It's fine," he said flatly.

"No, it's not, and I'd like to make it up to you. Is there any way I can?"

"Can you heal a broken childhood?" he deadpanned.

"No," I replied, somewhat annoyed that he was already so intent on keeping me from helping him.

"Then there's nothing you can do."

"Will my apology be sufficient?" I asked, trying to keep my language formal and polite. "I know it wouldn't be for me."

"Just go away and leave me alone," he replied, turning his face in the other direction.

"If that's what you want," I said, trying not to scowl in annoyance. "I hope we can still be friends though." I gave him a small smile.

He smiled back. A real smile.

I nodded in acknowledgment and turned to go, but couldn't help humming a few strains of one of the catchy happy songs I heard at the park.

"Wait!" I turned in question. "Actually, the med-nin said I may have slight insomnia, so…could you…maybe…help?"

"Of course!" I smiled widely at his uncomfortable expression. I mentally ran through my repertoire, then decided on one of the other songs I heard at the park open mike.

Two minutes later, Reiko was snoring softly.

"Well, I guess we'll leave now."

"I'm staying with him and Atsuko," Tsubasa informed us.

"Just—make sure he knows he's appreciated," I told Tsubasa.

"You're an old softie, aren't you, Tomoko?"

"My name does mean 'one who is friendly', you know." I shrugged.

"Really?"

"Yeah. Well, see ya around!"

"Yeah, sure."

Tsubasa waved 'bye' as we turned to leave, and after checking in with a nurse that it was, indeed, okay for me to leave, we exited the building. I greeted the sun with a smile and a spin.

"So, Deki, what number did you pick out for me?"

"You're number six."

"What about the rest of you? Except for you, sorry Kaida."

"No hard feelings. One of the best battles of my life, actually."

"Two."

"Huh?"

"I'm number two."

"Oh, okay Washi. Deki?"

"Three."

"Kazu?"

"I'm three too."

"Oh."

"Nah, I'm just messing with you. I'm number five."

"Dorothy?"

"I'm number six."

"I see. Seriously?" She nodded. "Oh well. Tie, here we come!"

"Tie?"

"Yeah, you're right, only if you're lucky, 'CUZ I AM AWESOME!"

"Tomoko, you're really strange."

"Thank you, Yumi!"

"Again, not a compliment."

"Again, you'd be insulting yourself, right?"

A moment passed and we all laughed.

After we all stopped laughing, we continued down the road, amazing by the sights and smells.

"It's so different from Kiri," Kaida commented."

"Yeah, I know. I can actually see all the way down the street!" I laughed while Washi and Deki started arguing about something like usual.

I attempted a cartwheel, but failed since we weren't in the middle of battle. Sad, right? But, again, I failed and stood up from the ground, dusty and a little dizzy. I stumbled my way over to a tree, and leaned up against it as my friends caught up, Yumi giggling and Kazu smiling as Deki ignored Washi, like always. I guess Deki lost the argument for once.

Then I just about had a heart attack when somebody fell out of the tree and landed not two feet away from me. After I recovered from my shock, I looked up to see two girls, my age, from the Leaf, both giggling. The one with honey-brown hair said, "Pachowie!"

The one with dark brown, curly hair grinned and called down, "Sorry!" to the boy in front of me who was just sitting up.

"Here." I held out my hand to the guy and helped pull him up. "I'm Tomoko, Riku Tomoko. Who are you?"

"Uzuro Kyosuke, and sorry for surprising you. My teammates tend to… erm… flail."

"No prob."

"The one with the lighter hair is Ensu Yasi, and—"

"And I'm Medo Chika! Nice to meetcha!" she exclaimed, jumping down and shaking my hand.

"Make some new friends, Tomoko?" Deki asked, smirking.

"You know what my name means, don't you? This is Uzuro Kyosuke, and his teammates Ensu Yasi and Medo Chika."

"Nice to meet you. Shimi Hideki, I'm Tomoko's teammate and they call me Deki. Our other teammate is Nisi Kazuyuki over there, and we call him Kazu."

They shook hands, while Dorothy took over.

"I'm Nanami Mayumi, but you can just call me Yumi. These guys are my team! This is Sou Kaida and—"

"Warami. Warami Washi," Zach gritted out while trying to push away the arm Yumi had slung over his shoulders. "By the way, congrats on your battle, Uzuro."

I froze in shock. "Who are you, and what have you done with Washi!" I asked, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him wildly.

"…Did I ever mention that I hate you?"

"Many times, many times."

"And you never listen."

"Of course not!"

"You're really annoying," he grimaced, pushing my hands off of his shoulders.

"Thanks!" I exclaimed, putting said hands on my hips.

"How many times do I have to tell you? It wasn't a compliment! You should know this by now!"

"I thought we went through this already, you'd be insulting yourself then, correct?"

"…It isn't as funny when we change it up."

"Agreed."

"So this happens often?" Kyosuke asked Deki.

"More often than seems bearable."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Ha. That stinks. It's bad enough with just the two on my team."

"No kidding."

"Yeah… Ever need a break, look me up."

"I'll keep it in mind."

"HEY! How come I'm not invited?" Washi whined.

"Because the point is to get away from _you_," Deki deadpanned.

"No need to be so mean, Deki!"

"Go look in a mirror, Tomoko."

"Yeah, so? I accept that I'm mean sometimes!"

"As do I."

"Oh."

"…"

"…"

"Tomoko talks a lot, doesn't she," Kyosuke stated innocently.

All he got in answer were five groans and one sheepish grin.

We continued down the street, having adding Kyosuke's team to our company.

"So, you passed the first round?" I asked, curious.

"Yeah. None of my teammates did, though. I'm number five, same as your teammate here," he answered.

"So did I sleep through this match, or were we out?" I asked Deki.

"It was the battle right after his," Kyosuke filled in when Deki shrugged.

"Cool."

"Well, we hafta go!" Chika and Yasi said at the same time from where they had been talking with Yumi.

"Yeah," Kyosuke nodded.

"Oh, well, see you around!" I waved.

"Nice meeting you!" Kazu called after them.

Deki nodded once in acknowledgment while Washi called, "Bye!"

Kaida put a hand up in a motionless wave, and Yumi yelled, "See ya!"

We walked along in near silence.

"I'm hungry," Washi spoke up.

"I am too," I chimed in.

"Korean barbecue or ramen?" Deki asked.

"Ramen. Barbeque is a little too heavy," Yumi answered.

"Great." We stopped at the booth and got seats.

"Hey kids." Surprised, I looked up and saw Shikaku-san entering the booth. "One pork ramen," he ordered.

He then sat down and looked us over.

"Well, how far did you get?" he asked.

"We all made it to the second round of battle, except for Kaida," Kazu told him as we got our orders.

"Oh, well congrats, and my apologies," Shikaku-san answered. "So I heard from my boy that you're quite the strategist. How'd you pass the first battle?"

"He licked her…" Washi muttered.

"Wha? That's an interesting strategy," Shikaku-san commented, bemused. Yumi smacked Washi upside the head.

"Don't take things out of context like that! It sounds perverted!"

"It's a perverted mind that makes things perverted!" Washi proclaimed.

Deki proceeded to ignore Washi and described the battle. Shikaku-san listened, nodding once in a while. When Deki finished telling the story, he nodded again, approvingly.

"You'd make a great strategist. Wouldn't mind having you on our side."

"But we're from the Mist…" Kazu trailed off, slightly depressed.

"You know, there's a festival tomorrow if you want to go," Shikaku-san informed us.

Yumi and I looked at each other and grinned.

"Deki!"

"Kazu!"

"Can we go?" we whined in unison, giving puppy dog eyes until we couldn't stay serious and we broke out into laughter at their weirded out expressions.

"No, really, can we?" I asked, wiping tears out of my eyes.

"Sure, but we don't really have anything to wear," Deki said.

"There's this place that my wife gets all of our formal wear from," Shikaku-san said. "They make very versatile yukatas, very lightweight and easy to move in."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Here's the location." He proceeded to draw out a map for us and handed it to Deki.

"Thanks!" I exclaimed.

"It's no problem," he replied.

"Bye!" Turning back to my friends, I said, "Why don't we postpone our dates until tomorrow and just relax today? I have to go find this store and get our yukatas paid for. The rest of you guys can do whatever, but stay on peoples' good side. We're from the Mist, you know. It's surprising that no one has been rude to us yet."

"I'm coming with you," Yumi immediately said.

"_I'm_ heading over to Ten-Ten's mentor's shop," Kaida said.

"Wait, she was that, what, nine year old? That teacher's aide?" Washi asked, a little weirded out.

"She's ten or eleven. And she kicks ass with all of her weapons. She knows how to use some I don't, I know how to wield some that she doesn't." Kaida shrugged. Then in a split second, her katana was up to Washi's neck. "Why? You got a problem with that?"

"N-n-no!" Washi choked out, coughing once the blade was taken away from his neck. "Are we allowed to spend any money?" he asked with urgency, referring to our combined budget, and wanting to get away as soon as possible.

"…Five dollars."

"Great! Arcade, here I come!" He hightailed it away from the rest of us, especially since Kaida left immediately after he did and in the same direction.

"Deki? Kazu?"

Kazu shrugged. "I guess I'll go after Kaida and see what types of weaponry they've got."

Deki opened his mouth to speak, but Yumi beat him to it. "No, you are not going to train or research. Have some fun! Go with Kazu and Kaida or I'll make you join Washi."

Deki sighed resignedly before following after Kazu, muttering under his breath about 'over-controlling females' and 'bipolar teammates'.

"You sure you're not a mind reader too?" I asked Yumi. She grinned.

"Nope!"

We waited until Deki was an acceptable distance away before Yumi and I started walking towards the hospital and discussing matters. We finally decided on designs and colors for each of us, if the shop could have custom-made yukatas finished in time.

Upon arrival at the little shop, an old lady greeted us. After learning that yes, the shop did custom-make yukatas, I gave her the measurements for all six of us. Yumi and I then informed her on the color schemes and patterns for each person. She kindly assisted by deciding the styles and designs of the yukatas themselves, and enlisted us in helping her.

Thankful for something to do, we immediately set to sorting through and organizing the many rolls of printed silks and cloths she had in her store. When our task was finished to her liking, she shooed us away so she could get working, trusting us to pay the next morning when we picked up the finished yukatas. She waved off our profuse "thank you"s and nearly literally kicked us out.

"She must have been a ninja," I stated.

"Of course! How else could she finish at least six yukatas in one afternoon _and_ kick us out the door?"

"Yeah, plus, in the yukatas, she planned all those hiding places and holder for _sharp stuffs_!" I exclaimed.

"…You mean weapons?" Yumi asked.

"Yeah! Sharp stuffs!" I replied.

"God, you're weird."

"That's the definition of Riku Tomoko!" I grinned.

"What, no 'thank you'?" Dorothy teased.

"No, I thought I'd change it up a little for once!"

"Great," she said sarcastically.

"Now, to Ten-Ten's mentor's store or to the arcade?"

"I'll go to the arcade. _You_ don't know how to handle Washi like I do."

"Yes, I do! Just bribe him with secrets about _you_! Like that time at the hot springs when y—"

"Shut up!" she hissed, clapping a hand over my mouth to muffle the squeal I let out when she jabbed me in the side.

"Oww… That wasn't very nice," I pouted.

"Life's not nice. See ya later." With that, Yumi took off.

After standing there grinning stupidly for a few seconds, I went in the opposite direction.


	22. Ch 22: Blade of the Night

Ch. 22: Blade of the Night

* * *

Upon arrival at the weaponry specialty store, I had to immediately duck as a dagger came soaring out the door and into the street. I straightened up and stepped inside, only to stop in shock at seeing Washi.

"Wait—what are you doing here?" I asked suspiciously.

He shrugged. "The arcade was lame."

"But Yumi just went to look for you!"

"Really?"

"Ye—EEK!" I shrieked as someone poked me in the sides after sneaking up behind me. I whirled around in anger to see Yumi snickering at me. "YOU MEANIE!"

"Life's mean to ya sometimes."

"Gah…"

It was then that I noticed that Kaida was plus one sheathless, tipless katana, and minus one large scroll containing a giant water mace.

Turning towards her, I asked, "Hey, Kaida, what happened to your mace?"

"I traded it in for this," she answered, gesturing towards the katana she was holding. "It's a water katana. It's a lot easier to use with my other katana. Plus, when you put chakra in it, it can be used to manipulate water if you have chakra that is of that elemental affinity."

"Oh, COOL! Wait… how do you know what chakra affinity you are?"

We all jumped as a loud crash sounded and there was a loud 'boom'.

"OVER HERE!" someone bellowed. I looked behind me to the door, and saw Kaida's ten-year old friend Ten-Ten waving. When Yumi winced at her loud volume, she toned it down to a speaking voice and said, "Sorry! I can't hear myself right now! Explosion went off in my ear!"

We nodded in understanding and Kaida walked up to her.

"What's so important?"

"HUH?"

"WHAT'S SO IMPORTANT?"

"OH YEAH—sorry… we just got a new shipment of chakra paper, and if you guys want some, each sheet costs as much as one game at a cheap arcade."

"It tells you your chakra affinity?"

"Yep!" Ten-ten answered, and I assumed she'd begun to read lips.

"COOL!" Washi yelled. He immediately handed over the five dollars meant for the arcade, and we all received a very thin piece of paper.

"You just put in a little chakra. Let's start with you, Kaida!" Ten-Ten chirped.

Kaida's paper became damp, then split in half.

"Okay… It turned damp, so you've got water, and it split in half, so you've got wind." She pointed at Kazu next, and his reacted the same way as Kaida's. "Water and wind."

"Cool! Wind! WHOOSH!" he exclaimed.

Yumi rolled her eyes and applied chakra. Hers turned sopping wet, but it also froze.

"Mayumi, right? Well, your chakra has an especially strong affinity to water, and you also have an affinity to… ice?"

"It's a kekkei genkai," Yumi informed Ten-Ten.

"Oh! OH! ME NEXT!" Washi yelled. His turned damp, then with a cloud of steam, ignited and turned to ash.

"Interesting combination. You've got affinities to water and fire."

"AWESOME!"

"Makes sense, considering how easily he learned and performed the fireball jutsu," Deki commented. A second later, his paper was damp. Then, it crumpled up.

"Huh. Water and lightning," Ten-Ten defined.

Deki shrugged and the six of them turned to me expectantly.

I released the smallest amount of chakra into the paper. Nothing happened.

"What?" Washi asked in response to my confused expression.

"I put in chakra, but nothing happened," I explained.

"That's funny. These are supposed to be really sensitive," Ten-Ten said. "Try putting more chakra in!" she suggested.

I increased the chakra flow, yes, _flow_, but still, nothing happened.

"Weird. Then try putting a lot."

I did so, and the paper became damp, just slightly.

"Well, that's the weakest reaction I've ever seen. Maybe it's defective…" she reached and handed me a new one. "Try again. It's on me."

Once again, even with me applying enough chakra for a jutsu, the paper just barely became damp.

"Well, you're water natured, I guess." Ten-Ten still looked at a complete loss.

"Maybe it's just sweat and she has no nature," Washi commented offhandedly.

"Women do not sweat, Washi," Yumi admonished. "...We glisten."

"Whatever."

"Well, with your team, all of you are weaker against a same level earth move if you use a water jutsu. But, with the same level and same power, lightning overcomes earth, wind wins over lightning, fire beats wind, and water overcomes water. You'd have quite the run-around battle between the si—er, five of you," Ten-ten commented.

"Yeah, well, Tomoko has that cool genjutsu eye thingy!" Washi exclaimed in my… defense?

"Washi? Are you feeling okay?" I asked, worriedly.

"Shut up! I can be nice sometimes…"

Yumi and I burst into laughter, and Kaida commented, "Good one," treating it as a joke. Washi sulked.

"Well, I've got some other weapons like the katana Kaida has! Would you like to see some of them? We've got a pair of fire producing daggers and some electricity resistant blades and some wind cutting knuckle knives and…" Ten-Ten continued to babble with excitement, but I listened with only half an ear, more interested in exploring on my own.

Then I saw _it_. _It_ was a katana without a tapering tip, but with a slanted flat edge for an end so there was a pointed tip. The sheath and handle fit together in a lopsided, backwards 'Z'-like shape. The smaller point was accentuated as a thin black stripe that ran down the length of the front of the katana and wrapped around the cover most of the backside. The rest of the backside, the smaller point, was accentuated by a thin white line, running down the length and wrapping around to cover the larger part of the front that was not black. As I looked at it, studying it, I became aware of a faint humming noise.

"Ah, yes, the legendary Blade of the Night." An elderly man with a white beard and wise-looking gray eyes appeared from further within the shop. "Also known as Night Cutter and Blade of Darkness. Legend has it that only its fated wielder can unsheathe the blade. Many believe there _is_ no blade. No one in the past few hundred years has actually seen it, so no one really knows for sure whether there is a blade or no."

Washi immediately perked up at what seemed to him a challenge. "Oh yeah? I bet I can open that sword!" At that statement, the humming noise suddenly became a bit stronger, a bit higher pitched.

"First, it's unsheathe, and second, listen! He's saying something else!" Yumi whispered fiercely.

"If you look closely, you'll see that it really isn't black and white."

I looked closer, and sure enough, when the light hit it, the blade's sheath was revealed to be of a dark crimson color.

"It's beautiful," I remarked breathlessly.

"Yes, it is, isn't it? But the blade is cursed. It is said to bring death among those close to the wielder, but death to the wielder's enemies as well. A trade-off of sorts, I suppose. According to legend, it was associated with so much death and bloodshed that it became known as the Blade of the Bloody Night."

"Sounds familiar. 'Village Hidden in the Bloody Mist', anyone?" Washi laughed at his own joke.

The old man continued to speak as though he hadn't heard Washi. "Barely anyone even remembers what color the blade is. Some say it's silver; others say it's black. Still others say it's a blood red; a few believe it's as white as fresh snow. I've even heard it said that it changes colors according to who the wielder is."

Ten-Ten continued, "It's always been my wish to see the blade." The younger girl smiled sadly. "It's associated with death and loss of family, but since I have no family left, it's my dream as an aspiring weapons mistress to see the blade with my own eyes."

The elderly man nodded in agreement, his gray eyes sad. "But, now, would you like to try your hand at unsheathing the sword? You could be its destined owner!" But by the tone of his voice, you could tell he didn't believe his own words. He sounded like an old man losing the last of his hope.

Kaida shrugged and received the blade reverently. The humming lowered in pitch considerably. She put her hand on the handle, but with the slightest tug, she shook her head and handed it to Washi. The humming instantly turned to a high-pitched whine. Washi, completely excited, found that for some reason, he couldn't even touch the handle. He gave it disappointedly to Yumi. I sighed in relief as the whine went back down to a low hum. Yumi couldn't unsheathe it either. Down the row it went to Kazu. Kazu held the sheath in his hand and immediately shook his head, but tried the handle anyway. It didn't budge. Next was Deki.

He was just about to try unsheathing the blade when two marks appeared on the katana. One was on the front of the katana, on the white, at the farthest end of the handle. The other was on the back, at the sheath side of the seam between sheath and handle, also in the white. They were both… black flowers. As soon as the marks appeared, the noise turned to a slightly higher, more agitated buzz.

Deki showed the old man, and the man's gray eyes widened. "Ten-Ten, dear, the rightful possessor of the blade is near!"

The girl's eyes also widened in shock.

"We've gotta find him!" Ten-Ten exclaimed.

"Her, dear, _her_. The symbol is of a flower."

"Yamanaka flower shop! Let's check there!"

At once, they both dashed out the door. It would seem that the old man had once been a ninja, as he kept up with Ten-Ten quite easily, even urging her to go faster.

Yumi, Deki, Kazu, Washi, Kaida and I stood there, bewildered.

"They forgot the sword," Deki commented, still holding said katana.

"Better go give it to them!" I exclaimed, grabbing the katana and racing through the door, excited for some action, faintly noticing that the droning noise pretty much disappeared altogether, now just a low comforting hum. The others soon caught up, and we were racing on the rooftops, following Ten-Ten and the old man. They stopped in front of a flower shop. Yamanaka Natsumi and another, older blonde woman came out and greeted them. They talked for a little and we finally came to a stop next to the three of them.

"Excuse me, you forgot the—" he held up a hand, motioning for me to be quiet. He scanned the sky, and suddenly took to the roofs.

"The store!" he cried, just as alarms blared and a horde of men ran into the street, brandishing all kinds of weaponry. The old man landed in front of them, and Ten-Ten whispered into the blonde woman's ear before joining the old man. The woman quickly set it off in the direction of the weaponry store, presumably to lock up and take care of matters there. Natsumi then went to back up the old man and Ten-Ten. The horde of ninja stopped right in front of the three of them, all of them leering.

"Little girls, old man, whatcha' gonna do? We gotcha' surrounded," the man right in front of them sneered. Sure enough, there was a thick ring of armed men around the three of them. The empty space at the center of the crowd was soon filled up by Kaida, Kazu, and Yumi. Washi, Deki and I were engulfed by the outer edge of the crowd of weapon-bearing ninja.

"I advise you to gently drop the stolen weaponry before you get your asses kicked," Ten-Ten growled, astonishingly scary for a ten-year-old.

"Hmm… how about I say 'no' and you turn and leave us alone, little girl? How old are you? Six?"

The response had Ten-Ten grinning ferally.

"Actually, I'm ten. Oh, and wrong answer." Immediately, the men rushed forward and the six I knew were in the middle of the crowd could not be seen. But you could tell they were doing just fine, the growing pile-up of unconscious men a testament to that.

Washi and Deki fought from the outer edge in towards the middle while our friends in the center tried to fight their ways out.

I kept out of the way for the most part. I was not very good at hand-to-hand combat, and I had no jutsus that would be useful in this situation and environment. So, instead, I made sure no one got away with any stolen weaponry.

I froze when I heard a shrill, enraged shriek.

Yumi, still kicking and thrashing, was restrained by two large men on either side of her. One of the men had a fistful of her hair. He yanked hard on it in an attempt to get her to stop struggling, and Yumi shrieked again. The humming noise started again in response to my own growing fury.

Yumi would fight tooth and nail, so I looked to see how in the world she could possibly have been captured and restrained. That's when I saw, about fifteen feet in front of her, that Washi was lying on the ground with a large bruise blossoming across his face, and a large foot on his back. I followed the foot to a leg, then up to a large man—my eyes widened in fear then narrowed in rage. He had a crossbow, loaded with a steel tip arrow, and it was pointed straight at Yumi, who was fighting against the two men even harder than before.

Time crawled. His finger inched closer and closer to the trigger. My anger grew the closer it got. The appendage finally made contact with the release, and triggered the arrow to launch. I heard a muffled shout from Kazu through the fury pounding in my ears, and pained "NO!" from Deki, overpowered by the humming thrumming through my head. I could tell just by what little I could hear that they wouldn't make it in time. Washi was unconscious, and I was the closest friendly person to her. My feet began to move automatically, blade sheath clenched in my left hand, the humming coursing through my bloodstream, and I sprinted, not knowing exactly what I could do, doing what my instincts told me as instructed by the humming.

Then I was in front of her, the arrow coming straight at me, her shrieking harmonious with the humming of what must be the blade singing, and—

_Clang._

I stared in shock at the bared blade in front of my eyes. Well over half of it was still sheathed, but just enough of the metal was revealed to deflect the arrow. I looked in amazement at the blade. Not a scratch was on its black surface. But as the light hit it, I realized it was not black, it was of an even darker crimson than the color on its sheath.

For what seemed like an eternity, everything froze and we were all staring at the blade, it barely computing in the far recesses of my brain that the humming was gone and there was just a comforting vibration-feeling tickling the back of my mind, soothing my nerves.

Then, I heard the old man rasp out, "The destined wielder of the Blade of the Night has been found."

"Clear out," one of the men ordered in a hushed tone, and the men quickly made themselves scarce, leaving only their weaponry and their blood in their places.

"I've finally seen the blade! Thank you for making an old man's last wish come true." The elderly man hobbled over.

"Oh, should I pay for it then, since I used it, sir?"

"Call me Ruichi, dear."

"Then please call me Tomoko."

"Yes, well, Tomoko, dear, we did not pay for this blade. It was donated to our shop by a traveling weapons trader who was tired of it and its alleged background ruining his business. Our shop, you see, is based on a long-standing tradition of customer loyalty, so we had no fear of it ruining any of our business. I plead that you will take it with you. The blade has been aching to be wielded."

"Ah, thank you so very much, Ruichi-san."

"I just have one thing to ask. May I please see the blade?"

"Of course!"

He inspected it gingerly, never actually touching it. Then he put his hands together in a sign in front of his face, and muttered, "Kai! So it isn't an illusion… Hmm… so the blade is black…"

"No, Ruichi-san, it's a very dark red. See?" I put it into a ray of sunlight, revealing it once more to be of the deepest crimson.

"Just beautiful," Ruichi-san mumbled to himself. "Dark red? So it is, so it is. Well, this old man's wish has been fulfilled. Ten-Ten, would you be a dear and teach Tomoko here how to wield the blade properly? I can just see the potential in her."

"Yes Ruichi-san."

He continued to admire the blade, muttering to himself. I offered for him to hold the blade, but he refused again and again without giving a reason. Ruichi-san's eyes widened at one point when he saw what the flower on the blade had morphed into, but he finally tore his eyes away from it reluctantly, and turned back to me.

"Thank you once again, Tomoko, for fulfilling my last wishes." With a hand motion, he dissolved into a silver dust.

"Well, that was dramatic." I turned in surprise, only to realize that Yamanaka Natsumi was still in our company. "If you ever need a sparring partner and you're in the area, look me up at the shop. Well, I gotta go. Bye!" she called as she walked back to the flower store.

I looked down at that point and ran my fingers over the mark on the katana that Tsubasa said was what my Mangekyou Sharingan looked like.

Ten-Ten and the others continued to gush in awe and excitement over the sword and the fact that it was _me_ who had unsheathed it. Ten-Ten and I made plans to meet the next morning for lessons.

But even among all of the excitement, I couldn't get Ruichi-san's words out of my head.

_The blade is cursed. It is said to bring death…_ I stopped mid-thought. _Wait, I fulfilled his last wish__es__?_


	23. Ch 23: The Festival

Ch. 23: The Festival

* * *

Night passed and morning came. I left the inn early and met Ten-ten at the shop, and she began to teach me how to wield the katana. Despite being only ten years old, she was a good teacher and excelled in using the weapons she knew how to use. I was thrilled at finally being able to do close combat as she also taught me some simple taijutsu. She informed me that Ruichi-san was right in that I had a lot of natural skill and potential. Though I thanked her humbly, after three hours I had learned everything she had to offer.

Yamanaka Natsumi stopped by while I practiced and sparred with me for an hour, using two blades, half the length of my katana with a chain connecting the two by their handles. She manipulated them as daggers and as nunchukki, and managed to win one match and tie the other two by using her superior experience.

I was panting by noon from both the hot midday sun, something non-existent in Kiri, and from sparring. Waving a goodbye to Natsumi, I headed to the shop to pick up our yukatas. Then I went to the inn and distributed them.

Yumi squealed in excitement. Kaida began to see how many weapons she could conceal in it. Kazu waved it around like a flag while Deki stared at it with a slightly apprehensive expression. Washi looked at it then let out a loud, "HELL no!"

But eventually, with some prodding and bribing (read: threats aplenty), the boys promised to wear them (Kazu wanted to use his as a curtain), and Yumi, Kaida and I departed to our own room to get ready.

All three of us kept on a pair of tight ninja shorts and a pouch with weapons strapped around our thighs. Our headbands went around our waists, so they would be on our person but concealed under the yukatas. I kept my chest bound but put on a mesh tank top before slipping into my yukata and asking Yumi to tie up the obi. She forced me to remove the yukata and tank top and put on a brassier, at least, to give the support of breasts while still being able to move comfortably if we had to fight. I compromised and kept my chest bound but put a stuffed bra on to give the illusion of a normal-sized chest. Then I put the tank top and yukata back on and Yumi tied up the obi.

My yukata was very simple. It was deep red and made of a lightweight, flowing cloth. The red background was patterned with large silver snowflakes and one-inch wide silver hems around the ends of the sleeves, the bottom, and the cross-over top. The skirt covered my feet and barely missed brushing the ground. The skirt had no partition and was more like a dress than a traditional yukata, and the obi with also silver. I arranged the crimson flower in my hair, then went to help Yumi with her obi.

Yumi's yukata had a pink and yellow color scheme. Hers was more robe-like and less dress-like than mine. A hem, scalloped in orange and dark pink, followed every loose, flappable edge on her dress but the sleeves. The body cloth was yellow with light pink sakura, the scattered flowers starting small at the top and getting larger the closer to the ground it was. The backside of the yellow cloth was a medium shade of pink, and her obi was a dark pink, matching the lace up slippers she had bought somewhere. There was a wreath of pink and yellow flowers adorning her head like a headband, nestled back behind her bangs.

Kaida's yukata was of a rich brown cloth with gold stars embroidered in. The loose edges, including the sleeves, were also hemmed with a half-inch of gold, and her obi was very wide and also gold. The yukata brushed her toes, and she pinned back her hair with a brown star pin. She also wore a necklace of two intertwining strings of beads, one brown and one gold.

We finished arranging ourselves and went across the hallway to the boys' room. We ended up helping them with their obis (stubborn butts) and stepped back to view the final result after some messing with their hair.

Deki's yukata was made with a purple cloth with a white shuriken pattern. The hem was decorated with a zigzag pattern, white on purple. The obi was purple zigzag on white, and his hair was combed. Yumi tried to get him to slick it back, but of course, he refused.

Washi wore a black yukata with light green flames reaching fingers up from across the bottom and the ends of the sleeves. It was hemmed with a very thin line of dark green, and his obi was also a dark green. His hair was 'artfully' (yeah right) messy.

Kazu, my date, had the yukata with dark blue material. There were grey teardrops embroidered on, and the hemming was a blue-tone gray. His obi was a darker, more neutral gray, and he had consented to a haircut. His trimmed hair was parted to one side and gelled.

Deki offered his arm, like a gentleman, and Yumi took it, and they walked out the door arm in arm. Kaida went out, sharpening a kunai, and Washi followed, grumbling at his lack of a date. I grabbed Kazu's proffered hand and yanked him down the hall. We raced to the festival.

He let me win.

We waited for our companions to catch up, and spotted Natsumi and her teammate Zurasaki Asa, Uzuro Kyosuke's team, Mashiro Saki and Reiko and their teammate, and many of the other Konoha rookies. We also saw Kokano Michiko and Tokomi Kohei with their teammate, Senpa Hiroshi. They were all crowded around a booth. Kazu and I went over to check it out. I laughed when I saw that Sanamori Haru was the victim of a dunk tank. And Natsumi's younger brother, Hideaki, was aiming for the large target painted on the trigger.

I pushed through the crowd to Natsumi.

"So, Natsumi, think he'll actually do it?"

Natsumi laughed, and Michiko cut in. "Tsumi doesn't think he can. According to her, he's got great aim, but his 'admiration' will get in the way for sure. Personally, I could care less. I'd dunk him myself, but-" Michiko's words were drowned out as Natsumi's laughter got exponentially louder at Michiko's 'dunk him myself'.

"HA! Like you could throw that hard!" Natsumi cackled. Michiko punched her in the arm as Kazu looked at me for clarification. I filled him in on how Hideaki completely idolized Haru, so we were sure he wouldn't have it in him to dunk his idol. I also made sure that he knew that Natsumi teased Michiko on a regular basis on being a 'weakling'.

We suddenly heard a metallic clunk and a loud splash and looked over to find Haru completely soaked.

"Proved you wrong," Hideaki sang as he walked past. He probably would have kept walking, except Yumi was not pleased with losing her bet and decided to take revenge. So, with a water jutsu, she doused his head.

"There! Now you match with Haru! Aren't you happy?" she exclaimed.

Hideaki simply glared, then walked the opposite direction from before, toward the Yamanaka flower shop. Natsumi shook her head, dying with stifled laughter, and Deki and I quickly pulled Yumi away before she could wreak more chaos.

Kazu, Yumi, and Washi decided we all should go on the Ferris wheel. The view was spectacular, despite my fear of heights. Ha. A shinobi with a fear of heights. Next you'll be hearing of a Mist ninja afraid of water. Oh wait- that's my younger brother.

Anyway, Deki and Washi had the _brilliant_ idea of duking it out during the middle of the ride. We barely managed to keep from being banned from going on the ride again.

We continued to wander around, joining up with acquaintances every once in a while. We were walking aimlessly down a street when we spotted Naruto, Sasuke, and Ten-ten in a play. It was being performed by their Academy classes, so we decided to stop and watch, just to see the kind of things they did that we didn't. Yeah, like the Mist trainers would ever organize a _play_, of all frivolous things, for young shinobi to perform...

It was interesting, to say the least. Naruto and Sasuke broke into a fight halfway through, unsurprisingly, Shikamaru, the one in charge of scene and backdrop changes, fell asleep, unsurprisingly. And right during their bright and shining moment together, Ino and Sakura fought over the stealing of the spotlight, of which there were two. Again, unsurprising. There was also the minor issue of Ten-ten waving 'hi' using the hand that was holding a very sharp, very long, very scary katana. But in general, it was put on well enough. That was in the opinion of us Mist kids, though, who had never experienced such a thing before, so I guess it was a very unqualified opinion...

But anyway, after the play ended, I stood up, stretched, and looked around at the rest of the audience. Yumi was already pushing Deki to the entrance to go solo on their date, and Kazu was looking at me, asking "What next?" while Washi pestered Kaida into taking him back to the 'lame-o' arcade. We had already made plans to meet back up on a hill half-an-hour before the fireworks started once we split up according to buddy system, so Kazu and I decided to check out some game booths. We were walking to the exit when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and a certain someone with a black yukata and long hair and pronounced tear ducts and those gray eyes greeted, "Good evening, Riku-san."

My mind racing for a name, I quickly replied, "It is, isn't it, Hotaru-san? Please call me Tomoko- 'Riku-san' is way too formal."

"Of course, Tomoko-san."

"Oh, Hotaru-san, this is my date and best friend, Kazu-yuki," I finished awkwardly.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Kazuyuki-san."

"The same to you," Kazu replied a little uncomfortably.

"Oh, Kazu, Hotaru-san is someone I bumped into when we first arrived. What was it you wanted to show me? It was that certain breed of white chrysanthemum, correct?" I wound the yarn as I went along. Oh, and chrysanthemums, especially _white_ ones? Not suspicious at all.

"Ah, yes, it's just on the edge of town," 'Hotaru-san' replied.

"So, Kazu, why don't you go wait for me at that dango place. I'm sorry," I apologized, especially for _chrysanthemums_, although he probably wasn't aware, "but this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance. They bloom at night and they glow! I'll tell you all about it later, and I'll be right back," I promised.

Kazu grinned. I smiled in appreciation. "I'll go win a stuffed animal!" he cheered excitedly. "Come back soon, though," he added on a more serious note. I nodded and he took off to one of the shooting game booths.

"So, to those 'chrysanthemums'?" I flinched slightly and nodded.

He took off toward the forest, and, after a momentary hesitation, I followed after him. We arrived at the branches of an old, sturdy tree a few yards in.

"Cute kid," he commented.

"Old friend," I said off-handedly. "Let me introduce myself properly. Riku Tomoko, and it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Uchiha Itachi."

"So you are well aware of my identity now," the Uchiha remarked. He stood there with a blatantly half amused, half bemused expression. "Why are you not running away?"

At his words, I relaxed into a less 'battle-ready' mode. "Simple. I haven't heard your story yet, so I refuse to make a judgment on you."

At that, he very dryly and clinically told the story of how he massacred his clan but left his brother to wallow in the pitiful misery of his new life, ran away, and became a rogue. Except that he told it in even less words and in a dispassionate tone that made it seem more like he was giving a report than telling about his own life.

"Well, that means that you're either extremely cruel to leave him as the only one alive, or you're a softie and just can't bring yourself to kill him." Adding in the factor that he made the risky move of coming back, and expounding on the fact that he had not tortured him, but simply watched Sasuke at a time that was happy, I guessed the reason to be the latter, not the former. I nodded with conviction after building my case.

"I could just be waiting for a better time," he remarked.

"What better time could there be than right in the middle of his fun, especially in a large public place where he will be humiliated, right in front of his rival and his classmates?"

"What if I do not want too much publicity or attention?"

"Sorry to burst your bubble, Uchiha-san, but the kid has attention on him 24/7 what with all of those annoying, obsessed stalkers that call themselves fans. It'd be a near impossible feat, and I somehow get the feeling that people would know it was you, just by the fact that you killed all of the rest.

"And if I'm just doing this for an ulterior motive?"

"You haven't killed _me_ yet, and I'm prying. That's gotta mean something."

He nodded with approval. "You are the first person who wasn't immediately judgmental or prejudiced. Why is that?"

I thought back on my friends and delivered a vague answer about how I knew someone who was persecuted from a very young age because of prejudice and ignorance and how I had vowed not to do the same. He nodded and then there was silence.

"Aren't you going to ask me what I am doing here?" His question caught me off guard and I started, losing my footing and pitching backwards. I braced myself for an impact that never came. I opened my eyes and found myself in the arms of Uchiha Itachi. He set me down carefully. I smiled.

"Now I know. Now I know why you're here. You're here because you miss him, you miss here. You came home."

He shrugged and grinned lopsidedly. It was actually extremely frightening, but I put it off as an expression he had never done and was still learning to do.

Then I frowned.

"This must be a sucky homecoming, then."

He shrugged noncommittally and grinned again. I cringed slightly.

"Ya know, you don't have to overexaggerate your expressions like that. It actually looks painful." At _The Look_ he sent me, I hurriedly explained how, though I may not be capable of expressing it myself, and if I was actually being observant, I could usually pick up on things such as emotions, even if they were very subtly expressed.

Then the corners of his mouth upturned, just in the slightest little twitch, and his eyes shone for a second, and I knew he was smiling. In all actuality, his smile was like an even more understated version of Deki's usual. I was learning.

"You should go. They're on alert because I told them you were here before."

He looked at me again, appraisingly.

"You are the strangest ninja, kunoichi or not, that I've ever met," he intoned.

I grinned. "Well, gotta live up to my name, don't I?"

He nodded. "Yes, that's it," he muttered introspectively. Then he looked up with purpose laced in his voice. "Farewell, Riku Tomoko."

"Bye, Uchiha-san!"

"...Itachi," he murmured before taking off, traveling deeper within the forest.

I sent out a primitive, clumsy, chakra-inefficient web of chakra just to make sure he left no trace of his own signature, uprooted a clump of mint to make some tea, then raced back to town.

* * *

A/N: The reason why the white chrysanthemums were so important is because white chrysanthemums are supposed to signify 'Truth'.

Pffft... Nice going, Tomoko.


	24. Ch 24: Fireworks

Ch. 24: Fireworks

* * *

I found Kazu sitting beneath a sakura tree, talking to Yumi. As I approached them, I heard Yumi say, "There's just no spark, really. I just don't think it'll work out."

I carefully backed away before they could notice me, leaving them alone. I went to find Deki instead. I noticed him sitting on a bench, looking woefully at a walrus stuffed animal.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"What's wrong?"

Deki sighed. "It's just not working." At my questioning expression, he proceed to tell me how he was so excited at first, then how, as time progressed, he was finding that he and Yumi really didn't have much at all in common.

"So what should I do?" he asked.

I thought carefully, gnawing on a senbon I had fished out of a pocket. Carefully wording my answer, I told him, "Truthfully, it's been a great night for me. Kazu is a gentleman, but things are slightly different between us on a date than regularly. And plus, I think there's another guy who I'm starting to like more," I admitted, thinking of the gray-eyed person who'd somehow managed to make me like him within three short encounters. "Kazu's just more like a little brother to me."

"You mean older brother," Deki corrected, "he's older than you, so your _older_ brother."

"Yeah, well, he acts younger. You and Washi and Kazu are my little brothers, knock yourself out trying to figure out in which order, Yumi is my twin sister, and Kaida's the awesome lady who lives across the street whose house we practically live at."

"Why doesn't Kaida get sibling status too?" he asked amusedly.

I shrugged. "Just because."

"Fantastic."

"So... wanna trade dates?" I asked, just to see how he'd answer.

"Nah, your date is weird."

"So is yours," I retorted.

"I know. Well, Kazu and Yumi are coming. You wanna see how they'll take it?"

"Dunno... You know me, I lack tact."

"You do."

I stuck my tongue out at him in retaliation.

The painful confrontation never came. Kazu and Deki held a conversation consisting of silence and a few nods from Deki, who then turned to me and said, "We're off the hook."

"So we can just be friends for now?" I asked in clarification.

"Friends," Kazu nodded.

A bell rang and we took off, realizing it was time to meet the others at the hill.

I'd fully expected Washi and Kaida to be waiting for us impatiently, but when we arrived at the hill, they were nowhere in the vicinity. We searched around in the area to no avail. Finally, we spotted them racing towards us, Washi looking somewhat flustered.

"Have fun?" Yumi asked, raising an eyebrow. Washi blushed and Yumi's other eyebrow soon followed her first.

"Shut up," he muttered.

Natsumi came bounding along and stopped to whisper something in Yumi's ear that made her eyebrows disappear behind her bangs and caused a smirk to grow on her face. Natsumi left quickly and Yumi grinned. Washi and Kaida were screwed.

"So, what's this I hear about Hana and Toshi?"

"I said shut up," Washi mumbled, turning even redder and I watched in fascination as ever-stoic Kaida began to flush too.

At my team's confused expressions, Yumi explained how, apparently, at a certain little Kissing Booth run by volunteer genin, her teammates were getting pretty cozy with a certain 'Kumizo Hana' and one 'Nagashi Toshi'.

I laughed hysterically with Yumi at Washi's mumbled, "She had a cool ass tattoo."

"Sure she did, sure she did," Deki taunted.

Then I jumped at a hand on my shoulder.

"Ah, forgive me for frightening you, Tomoko-san."

I blinked. I couldn't tell if he was Mr. Gorgeous Green Eyes or 'Hotaru-san' or some new creation.

"Who's your friend?" Kazu asked. Okay, not Hotaru, then.

"Oh, hi, Keiji-senpai!" I grinned with the slightest twitch in my left eye. 'Keiji-senpai' just kept the smile unwaveringly.

"I was hoping you would watch the fireworks with me," he intoned.

"Sorry," I answered automatically, "but I- wait, we're not, are we?" I asked in confusion.

Kazu laughed and said to go ahead and have a fun time with Keiji-san and to just make sure I got back before curfew.

Taking in Yumi's whispered, "Nice catch" through a haze and with my mind in a whirl, I wordlessly followed Keiji-senpai and joined him in the branches of a sakura tree with an unobstructed view of the sky.

"Are you crazy?" I hissed at Itachi-san. "I'm seriously considering stopping referring to you with a '-san' if you're going to be this stupid!" I snapped.

He smirked at me with amusement dancing in his eyes. "Then you'll just have to call me 'senpai', won't you?" he teased.

I huffed, crossed my arms and looked the other direction. Then I jumped in surprise at the first whistle before the first firework burst into colors with a loud, resounding "BOOM."

I watched in awe. The colorful sparks, the bright lights, and my mind filled with questions.

How did the sparks know where to go?

How did they get those colors?

Was it a civilian or a chakra-based art?

How did they make those sounds?

How did they know when to blow up?

I suppose I looked like a kid staring at a candy store display, because Itachi was smirking when I finally managed to tear my eyes away.

I just huffed again and went back to watching the show.

When the pyrotechnics stopped, much to my disappointment and Itachi's subsequent amusement, Itachi turned to me with an infuriatingly condescending expression.

"Shut up, ya big-" He cut me off wordlessly by pointing at something over my shoulder. I turned to see, on a hilltop, that Naruto was holding a sparkler in his hand and watching in amazement while Sasuke looked over his shoulder in awe.

"Your brother's cute," I commented.

"So are you," he replied.

I froze in surprise.

"So, interested in pyrotechnics, huh?" he asked, thankfully changing the subject. "Surprisingly, it's a civilian art. They're impressive, aren't they?"

"They're absolutely beautiful," I breathed.

"As you are." Okay, I totally set myself up for that one.

"We've got nothing like this in Kiri. Through all the mist, I don't think you'd be able to see them anyway."

"Kiri has you, doesn't it? I've heard the mist is good for hair, though."

"You _would_ say something like that, wouldn't you," I accused after looking at his ponytail of dark, glossy hair.

He shrugged. As people cleared from the festival, we continued to talk, him complimenting me every other sentence. I just kept acting as though nothing at all happened.

Finally, it started to really annoy me, so I asked him once why he kept doing it. He answered that he was 'simply fulfilling a duty'. Enigmatic and confusing as heck.

He told me about Sasuke; I told him about Minoru, my own younger brother. He spoke of his favorite festivals; I spoke of Kiri's lack of celebrations. Back and forth we talked about mundane things until I felt myself falling asleep. Still in the tree, the area as far as we could see was vacated and quiet but for a few lingering couples. I smiled upon seeing Washi and Kaida with their own interests, and was filled with a little sadness at seeing Yumi, Deki and Kazu just wandering aimlessly along.

"You should really go," I commented, eyes heavy.

"Let me walk you home first," he smiled.

And apparently, his definition of 'walking me home' consisted of him picking me up and carrying me bridal-style. His excuse being that he was, in fact, walking, not running or even jogging, and he was accompanying me home. I was too tired to fight very long, so as I struggled and he held on tighter, we came to a compromise and I rode on his back, piggyback. I gave him directions to the inn, and he fortified my grip with a hand of his own and began to travel by rooftop. I was too sleepy to say anything about it.

I let sleep overtake me as wind rushed past and stars twinkled overhead, two twin rings of gray watching over my rest.


	25. Ch 25: Training Begins

Ch. 25: Training Begins

* * *

Gray skies, colorful formations of falling stars, sakura petals drifting down like raindrops, Tomoko, wispy pink sugary clouds, metal tanks of clear, cold liquid, Tomoko, smiles, breezes, Tomoko, silky black threads, Tomoko, Tomoko, _Tomoko_...

"TOMOKO!"

I bolted upright, subconsciously noting I was in bed, it was bright out, I was... in P.J.s... no attackers?

"T-tomoko, could you p-p-please put the k-kunai down? I d-don't feel like getting my th-throat slit r-right now, please please don't kill me, I j-just wanted us not to b-be late-"

Friend. Throat. Kunai. Down.

I woke up fully to realize that, at the waking voice, I had acted on autopilot, grabbed the kunai from under my pillow and shoved it up against the carotid sheath of my "attacker".

I blinked, lowering the kunai.

"Oh. Hi Kazu."

I blinked again at the feeling of something coming in contact with my head. I looked down to see a bundle of my clothing.

"Get dressed," Deki called, exiting the room. "Our training starts in 20 minutes."

I blinked once more as the words took their time in reaching my brain. Waiting for connection... Analysis...

"SHOOT!"

* * *

"So what are we practicing today?" I asked as we neared the gates we had entered the village through.

"Debriefing," Deki deadpanned.

"Sure. What?"

He didn't answer and instead explained to the guards at the gate (unfortunately not the goons from last time) that we wanted to leave the village to train, handing him a note he had gotten from Sarutobi-san at some point. The guard scribbled something down and had us all sign a waiver and a sign-out sheet, giving us a pass each, necessary for re-entry. Kazu and I immediately handed ours to Deki, who wordlessly stored ours with his in his shuriken holster.

That was one of his quirks. While we all carried kunai holsters and another holster with shuriken, more kunai, and other smaller assorted weapons as well as a pouch for scrolls and larger items, he carried only a shuriken holster and a pouch for scrolls and larger items.. He despised using kunai and instead carried a ton of shuriken, wire, and gloves to hold shuriken for close combat without getting cut. We all thought he was crazy and had a total distance disadvantage, but he was able to hold his own against each of us, Kaida included, when we used kunai against his shuriken, so we let him be.

We walked back through the entrance, and took off through the bushes.

"I will be up against Sanamori Haru," he began. "He is a shinobi of the Leaf and is known by his peers for his intellect. In taijutsu, his broad frame makes for strength, but he is rather slow and clumsy. Unless I can outwit him, my best chance will be to have greater speed and agility. He also has great endurance, so I will also have to build up my own. Kazu, you will help me to improve speed and agility. I will train with you, Tomoko, to increase my strength."

We stopped at a clearing and Deki gestured for me to take the scroll off of my back. I did so and he released training posts and targets. He motioned for us to help him set them up as he continued to speak.

"Kazu, your opponent is Uzuro Kyosuke. Originally, he was from Oto, the Village Hidden in the Sound, but he and his family moved here in the last year. He is an intelligent and capable shinobi with a family tradition jutsu. He summons different intruments using this jutsu, and these instruments have the ability to give the player control over an element. For example, a trumpet calls forth fire. A flute starts up the wind. Drums control earth. The only issue with this jutsu is that the user can only control the element if they can play the instrument." Deki paused to drive a post into the ground.

"What instruments can he play?" Kazu asked. Giving up, Deki called me over. A few chakra-enhanced whacks with a mallet and the post was firmly rooted.

"He is proficient in percussion and can do some basic trumpet exercises."

"So I'm doomed," Kazu concluded.

"I began a rumor that you specialize in wind jutsus but only have the single water jutsu you used against Tsubasa."

"So?" I asked, curious of his plan.

"It is most likely that he will spend his time learning the trumpet."

"And?" Kazu prompted.

"And thus, I need to teach you some more water jutsus and you've got to improve your taijutsu further so, worst comes to worst, you can physically inhibit him from playing. Tomoko will help you in strength training. We will all have to do work to increase endurance. Understood?"

"Yes!" Kazu and I exclaimed in unison.

"And Tomoko." Deki turned to me. "Do not become arrogant or cocky in thinking that since Yumi is your friend, you know everything about her. Also, do not assume she will go easy on you. Your battle will be difficult because you have to forget she is a friend. Yumi can already do that successfully. You, on the other hand, cannot. Unless you train yourself to fight her as an enemy, you are doomed to fail."

"Gee, thanks for the encouragement," I said sarcastically, but I knew that he, unfortunately, was completely correct.

"You will work on your physical conditioning with us, but in your spare time, try to work on creating a new jutsu." With one more swing of a hammer, he drove the last nail into a target. "Training begins now."

Immediately, he made a water clone and set it to spar with me. The real him challenged Kazu to a race. As they took off, I noticed Deki pulling out a shuriken and his gloves. He was really challenging Kazu to a battle _with_ speed, not a battle _of_ speed.

I swung backwards instinctively at a breath of air tickling my arm and closely missed having my hair trimmed by a shuriken. The clone retreated, gloves on and a shuriken in hand, and stood at the ready, waiting for me to make the first move.

"Taijustu only or are jutsus allowed?" I asked, pulling out a kunai.

"No jutsus," the clone replied. He removed a shuriken from his pocket and motioned for me to make the first move.

I took a step backwards. The clone looked at me questioningly.

"Your move." The clone nodded, stepped forward, then stopped, so I took another step back and the clone pulled on his gloves. Then he paused, so I took a step forward only to find the clone holding his shuriken to my neck. I glared at him.

"Lesson number one. Don't expect your opponent to be fair." I huffed as he stepped back, adjusting his glasses. Quickly, I crouched down and kicked my leg out in a wide arc, hoping to knock his legs out from under him. I made contact and he caught himself with one hand and foot and immediately swung his free leg towards me. I blocked with my forearm and grabbed his leg, swinging it and its owner up and over my head until the clone smashed into the ground and dispelled.

Then I blinked as the same clone stood in front of me, hands in a sign. "Release. Lesson two. Don't expect your opponent to follow the rules." Growling, I hurled a multitude of kunai in a thick cloud. Multiple kunai hit him and the clone went 'splash', for real this time.

I sensed Deki and Kazu getting nearer, and they soon came crashing through the trees. Deki restarted the fight between us, sending out more clones.

Block a kick from above, fling out arms, flip back, spin around, fall back onto hands and bring legs up, kick clones in throat, flip back the rest of the way, chakra aided jump, hurl kunai, land, grab hold of clone, slit neck, make grass grab clone feet, jab at jugular, last one, crush windpipe, then I'm facing Deki. Feint a punch, windmill kick side with chakra added, collapses. Pick up by the throat... punch hard enough to knock unconscious.

Splash.

_He didn't._

"And _that_ is what I'm talking about."

_He did._

"You're perfectly fine on clones, but on real people- even rogues- you can't kill. You don't have kill before you're even a chuunin. I hope you don't have to, but here's rule number three: be _prepared_ to kill. Class dismissed."

Deki- the real one- turned back into the forest with Kazu trailing behind. Filled with a sudden inexplicable rage, I turned to the nearest training post and leveled it within seconds.

"Close weaponry combat," I muttered under my breath, taking off towards Ruichi-san's weapon store.


	26. Ch 26: Little Brother

Ch. 26: Little Brother

* * *

I arrived at the weapon store. Tenten was polishing a few short blades. She looked up and smiled when I said "Hi" and quicly put them back on display before asking me why I was back.

"What kind of weapon would you suggest for the way I fight?"

She considered it for a while, then told me to follow her. She led the way to the Yamanaka flower shop. She asked for Natsumi and we waited while her aunt got her from the back room.

"What's up?" she asked, brushing a strand of white-blonde hair behind her ear.

"Let's go to the training fields by the store," Tenten said.

So we walked to the training fields, and Tenten immediately commanded Tsumi and I to fight with our weapons. Tsumi shrugged.

"Sure." She pulled out her chain-connected blades and, letting go of one, swung it towards me.

I hit the ground, unsheathing my katana in a wide arc to catch her leg. Pulling the flying end back towards her, she grabbed it from midair and flipped backwards. Tsumi quicly sheathed both blades, flipping the clasps attaching the handles and sheaths together very carefully and securely. Then she began using the connected, sheathed blades as nunchukki.

I followed her example and sheathed my katana, sealing it shut with some 'sticking' chakra, the type used to walk up walls and tree trunks. I spun it experimentally like a long pole, then Tsumi came swinging and the battle became fiercer.

Duck, swipe, flip, kick up, swing right, twist, roll, check chakra glue, block, roundhouse kick, cartwheel, spin katana above head and backflip, swipe upwards, swing left, swing right, spin, check chakra, block, shove away, swing downwards. Then Tsumi swung her nunchukki at me again and I caught the chain around my katana. More 'sticky' chakra between the sheath and chain, chakra to arms, lift, spin, and release chakra.

But only the chain fell at my feet, Tsumi having unhooked her blades before soaring into a flip and landing softly.

"Use jutsus!" Tenten shouted. In response, I tossed a handy vial of plain scented water to distract Tsumi, then I quickly used a replacement jutsu to switch places with a log behind her so I could put a kunai up against her neck.

Then I gasped as I felt cold metal around my own neck, pulled taut but not choking. A simple genjutsu.

Tenten nodded in satisfaction before instructing Tsumi and I to follow her. Returning to the store, she pulled out a single weapon.

A senbon.

"Paired with poison, it can be a lethal weapon, even by itself. Easily concealed as well. You could have pulled one out coated in a paralyzing serum and jabbed it into Tsumi's femoral artery and she would have lost strength before she was able to choke you. Or there are pressure points, and all you need are speed and aim."

I nodded.

"Senbon require no elemental-style chakra, but careful application and control of regular chakra can allow you to direct senbon once they have left your control, much like the puppet masters of Suna."

"Like this?" I asked, sending a thread of chakra through the ground and up a table leg, managing with some difficulty to make a sword on display lift up vertically, hilt still in contact with the tabletop.

"Umm, yeah, I think so, but through the air. Try looking for a Hyūga for help. There's one in my class- a boy with ridiculously pretty hair, but his ability to see chakra would be really helpful."

"Thanks, Tenten, and you too, Tsumi."

"Glad to be of assistance. Come again!" Tenten smiled, waving goodbye and Tsumi doing the same.

"Hyūga, huh?" I wondered aloud as I walked toward the door. Then I tripped over a plastic garbage container, knocking it over and spilling its contents out.

My eye was immediately drawn to a piece of reflective material. Darn my fascination for all things shiny. I fished it out and felt my eyebrows draw together in confusion.

"Hey, Tenten, isn't this one of those pieces of chakra-affinity paper?" I asked.

"Umm... I think so," she said, perplexed. "I've never seen one like that, though. Does it have anything written on the back of it?"

"Let's see, it has R. T. on the back. Why?"

"R. T... Oh, that stand for Riku Tomoko. That was one of yours, but I have no idea what it means if it's shiny. I'd ask someone who knows a lot, like maybe Iruka-sensei," she murmured, "but if it's all the same to you, could I keep this one?"

I nodded, sorting through the worn polishing cloths and singed rags for the other glint of light I'd seen. I quickly grabbed the second piece that I remembered using before straightening up and nodding to Tenten and Tsumi.

"Well, see you guys around."

Tsumi waved while Tenten stared with a puzzled expression at the sheet of glossy paper in her hand. As I turned the corner, I found myself doing the same, pondering the meaning of a chakra-affinity paper looking as though it was covered in a metal with the flexibility of parchment and the clear gleam of crystal.

Curiosity piqued and mind made up, I turned towards the Hokage Tower. But I abruptly twisted back around at a glimpse of light I saw flash at the conrner of my eye. Then I fell flat on my back as the flash turned out to be a kunai. However, seeing a glaring orange as well, I immediately called out to the culprit.

"Naruto!"

"Sorry nee-chan!" he snickered cheekily, but his expression quickly turned to one of horror as he took in that I wasn't who he thought I was. His jaw dropped at the sight of the shiny metal insignia around my waist, and he took off, looking back every few seconds, squealing, "Sorry! It wasn't my fault!"

Shaking my head and muttering under my breath, I followed after him towards the Tower, trying not to laugh at the panicky shriek he gave when it became apparent to him that I was following him.

We finally came to the Tower and Naruto bolted up the stairs with me tailing him. He burst through the doors to Sarutobi-san's office which was, thankfully, empty but for the Hokage. Naruto immediately squealed, "Ojii-san, some girl is trying to kill me!"

"Really, now?" Sarutobi-san looked up to see me and smiled. "Did you do something to provoke her?"

"NO!" Naruto flat-out lied. "...Er...I said sorry!" he appealed.

"Riku Tomoko, correct?" I nooded. "I apologize for Naruto's actions. Now, I'm sure you had another reason for coming here, so Naruto," he turned to the Academy student, "run along and play with-"

"No," I cut in, "it's fine. He can stay." Sarutobi-san nodded, so I turned to Naruto. "You little brat. You invited me to watch your play but now you don't know me?"

Naruto peered through his ridiculously bright yellow bangs with equally ridiculously large blue eyes. Then his whole face lit up with a huge smile.

"Tomoko-nee-chan!" he exclaimed. "It's you!"

"Goofball. Be more careful next time," I admonished.

Then I turned to Sarutobi-san and explained the basis for my query. He kept a warmly impassive expresssion, but I could feel his chakra flaring out ever-so-slightly every once in a while, most noticeably when I showed him the chakra paper.

"So what does it mean?" I asked.

"From what I know about chakra and your abilities, it would seem that you have no affinity for any element. However, chakra control seems to come naturally to you. Am I correct in assuming that?" I nodded. "So, you could say that you have an affinity to chakra itself," he mused.

"Thank you, Sarutobi-san."

"How strange," he murmured, turning to the window on my left and waving his hand to dismiss me. I neatly tore the sheet in two and left half on his desk.

"Come on, Naruto," I called over my shoulder. He bounded up to me and slipped his hand in mine.

"Tomoko-nee-chan is so cool!" he exclaimed.

"You're not so bad yourself," I answered.

He grinned brightly enough to light up the whole village and kept the smile all the way to the inn.

"Thank you, fine sir, for escorting me home." I curtsied. He looked at me as if I'd grown another head. "You're supposed to bow and say something smart back!" I whispered.

"OH! Uh, I'm glad to eskirt you to your hou-" he did a double take, "-to your inn, m'lady."

"It's 'escort', but otherwise, perfect!"

"I remembered from a story the teacher told the class once," he confessed.

"Keep practicing, and then you'll be ready for when you meet an actual princess!" I encouraged, but Naruto was already tearing down the road to a distant pink shoulder-high blob.

"BYE NARUTO!" I bellowed.

It took a while for the sound to reach me, but I faintly picked up his answer.

"Bye Tomoko-nee-chan!"

Deki and Kazu came out to find me grinning like a certain idiot. They looked in the same direction as I still was, and turned to face me, puzzled.

"What?" Deki asked.

"I've got a younger brother."

"You already have one, remember?" Kazu's comment broke the spell, and I shook my head vigorously to clear it. I laughed lightly.

"Yeah, but this one is actually cute." I grinned cheekily. "Race you inside!"

Kazu won, of course, but it really didn't matter because Deki was truly smiling.

And me?

I had a younger brother who actually called me sister.


	27. Ch 27: Echoes

Ch. 27: Echoes

* * *

"_Tomoko! Tomoko!"_

"_'Noru?"_

"_There are big scary men at the door. Tomoko? Where are you going?"_

"_Stay here, Minoru."_

"_What? Don't boss me around! You're not Momoka-nee-chan!"_

"Stay. _Do you understand?"_

"_Fine."_

I didn't wake up screaming or in a cold sweat, but somehow, this nightmare was worse than the rest. It threw me off so badly that I nearly had my half of my hair and my neck shorn off when we were training that afternoon. I kept hearing the echoes of the dream, of Noru's voice saying "Tomoko, Tomoko," over and over and over again. Then that awful feeling where you know you're not going to make it in time, where you know you're too late and you can do nothing but watch helplessly-

I stopped dead in the middle of a sparring session with Kazu and Deki, hands clutching my head. I had been about to go into a spin, but I missed my footing at a yelled "Tomoko", choked up, and childishly shouted, "Shut up!" at the voice only I could hear.

My knees gave out and I sat down hard, shaking, barely missing having my body and my head separated by Kazu and Deki's combination taijutsu. Kazu and Deki slid to a stop and immediately made sure I was unharmed. Deki started to reprimand me, but I heard nothing but "Tomoko-Tomoko-Tomoko" in Noru's voice until I cut into Deki's tirade.

"Guys?"

"Yeah?"

"What!?"

"You know the- _her_- you don't like to talk about?"

"You mean Miki?"

"No, Kazu, the _her_ you have that was born the same year as the _her_ Deki has."

Deki looked at me questioningly.

"You don't mean-"

I let myself imagine a shock of long, tangled blonde hair blowing in the wind, its owner turning away, and Deki froze up.

"Kazu. The _her _you were always jealous of and yet the _her_ you pitied."

Kazu sobered at Deki's words. I cleared my throat uncomfortably.

"Yes, well- I have a _her_ as well," I whispered. "Her name was Momoka. She was older than me by a few years. Some men came to the house one night when I was eight. Noru, who was six, was the one who noticed them first. He came to me because he couldn't find his Momoka-nee-chan. I was second place. I was just Tomoko. I rushed outside to find the men beating her up, completely breaking her, stabbing her, killing her. She looked up at me, and I was staring at my own face. I hid behind a bush.

"When the men did what they came to do, they left. Momoka released the henge as soon as they turned the corner, but not before Noru saw her. He saw me, beaten up, turn into his Momoka-nee-chan, about to die.

"I still don't understand why she did that, but what I do know is that Noru only ever calls me 'Tomoko'. He never calls me sister." I looked up, grinning crookedly, fingers digging into my thighs to keep the shaking at bay. "That's why Naruto makes me so happy. He calls me Tomoko-nee-chan, like he's proud that I, Tomoko, am his sister."

Deki nodded sagely. "Well, if you're not going to stop abruptly and get yourself killed, time waits for no one and we've got to train."

I nodded and jumped up, taking a defensive stance.

"Come on guys, let's go!"

Kazu stood up as well, eyes burning with anticipation and we looked expectantly at Deki, who had just sat down. Kazu looked to me and I shrugged.

"Can you hear me?" I looked to Deki.

"...Yeah," I nodded. "Why wouldn't I be able to?"

"Because."

He looked up and spoke but his mouth did not move.

"It works."

He grinned.

And I understood.

_Nice..._

_Thank you. Won't this be fun for messing with Haru..._

"Poor guy," Kazu spoke aloud.

Deki stayed silent until Kazu and I both looked at him.

"What? Don't expect me to be a chatterbox. I don't 'gab', 'chat', and anyway, this takes chakra because I'm still not used to it."

I stared at him.

"What?"

"That was almost the most you've ever said willingly for next to no valid reason."

Deki groaned and face palmed.

I grinned and tossed a kunai towards a target nailed onto a tree. Then a hand plucked the kunai from midair and sent it flying back.

"Who are you?" Kazu asked the strange character.

He had a shock of silvery-gray hair, a mask, and used his forehead protector to cover up one of his eyes.

"Someone," he answered offhandedly.

"What are you doing here?" Deki inquired.

"Wanted to see if the rumors were true," the stranger quipped.

"I don't know... you seem like a stalker to me."

"And why would that be?"

"You look suspicious," I deadpanned.

"Aren't all shinobi?"

I nodded after a moment's consideration.

He had a point.

Deki continued trying to discern the man's identity, but I really didn't care too much. I focused instead on the plant life, hoping to make a large-scale "genjutsu" by actually changing the position of ferns, tree branches, and protruding roots. I meditated and focused on spreading my chakra out in a net instead of strands in order to cover more area at a single time.

I nudged a root to the tree behind Kazu over and shifted the branches of the tree to a different position. I changed the arrangement of the branches of the tree the man was leaning against, lengthened the weeds by Deki's feet-

Then I hid a grin as inspiration came to me.

I very carefully fed my chakra into the tree's network. Then, as the man stepped forward, I made the whole trunk shift completely to the left, making the man stumble backwards when he leaned back.

Heh.

I carefully moved the tree back to its original position and quickly retracted my chakra, fingers digging into my thighs to restrain the exertion-induced need to pant.

Then Mr. Strange turned to me and tilted his head to one side.

"Interesting... so the rumors are true. There really is a girl with an affinity to chakra itself. I'll be seeing you, Nisi-san, Shimi-san, and Riku-san."

He nodded to each of us in turn before teleporting off to God-knows-where.

"Weirdo."

"Creep."

"He's a shinobi," Deki remarked.

"Good point."


	28. Ch 28: Sweetest Night

Ch. 28: Sweetest Night

* * *

I grin confidently. There's no way I can lose.

Yumi curses, trapped in a man-made forest of brambles and thorns. I sprout noxious flowers within the forest to induce a genjutsu, and I hold my katana ready to run her through if necessary.

Then Yumi's voice cuts through my plans.

"You just don't let up, do you?"

"What?"

"Still going, even though you're doomed to lose…"

"What are you talking about?"

"Would you like to see my new jutsu?"

Rustling indicates her handsigns, even as I have yet to answer, and two figures materialize in front of me.

Momoka-chan.

And Noru.

Both coming for me with swords.

"Momoka-chan! Noru! What are you doing?"

"Who are you?"

"I'm your sister! Tomoko-nee-chan!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Your nee-chan! Momoka-chan, I can't believe you're alive!?"

"I've never seen you before in my life."

The scream catches in my throat as they close in, not knowing who I am and not caring to know, Yumi jeering at me with Kazu and Deki at her side.

And then there's a blade in my stomach and a voice whispers, "Hello, Tomoko-chan. Sorry that I lied, but I've been wanted this for forever-and-a-half."

And then another blade comes through the other side and Noru's saying, "_I'm_ not sorry I lied, Tomoko. It was worth it. Isn't this fun, Momoka-nee-chan?"

The blood is pouring, the metal is twisting, Noru and Momoka-chan are too close and they and Yumi and Kazu and Deki are grinning at my pain with hungry eyes and something is crushing my lungs and I can't breathe and I'm not sure I even want to anymore because _it can't possibly be worth it and_—

I woke up, hyperventilating, to Kazu using my stomach as a pillow and Deki's arm draped across my upper torso.

I thought about yelling, but paused.

It was warm.

Comfortable.

Safe, secure.

I shifted a bit and went back to sleep.


End file.
